Off his leash and going further into his spinmeister mode, Navarro coupled his diatribe with an attack on China. Now, mind you, China is no virgin in this. But, Navarro’s attack is not only silly on its face (sure, let’s add more colander and Reynolds Wrap to our politics), it’s curious given what has happened over the last six months, specifically as it relates to Navarro, Trump, and China.
On 1/29/20 Navarro wrote a memo warning that the coronavirus crisis could cost the United States trillions of dollars and put millions of Americans at risk of illness or death and made the case for "an immediate travel ban on China."
“The lack of immune protection or an existing cure or vaccine would leave Americans defenseless in the case of a full-blown coronavirus outbreak on U.S. soil....This lack of protection elevates the risk of the coronavirus evolving into a full-blown pandemic, imperiling the lives of millions of Americans.”
Hardly one month later, Navarro wrote a second memo requesting supplemental appropriation. "There is an increasing probability of a full-blown COVID-19 pandemic that could infect as many as 100 million Americans, with a loss of life of as many as 1-2 million souls."
So, what else was happening between the 1/29/20 and the 2/23/20 memos?
One day after Navarro’s first memo, the WHO, responding to concerns over its first analysis of the situation, reconvened, declaring that there was, indeed a pandemic. The WHO's Tedros announced that the outbreak had become a "public health emergency of international concern over the global outbreak of novel coronavirus."
It advised countermeasures. "Countries should be prepared for containment, including active surveillance, early detection, isolation and case management, contact tracing and prevention of onward spread of 2019-CoVinfection, and to share full data with WHO.” Travel restrictions were not recommended “based on currently available information”.
At a campaign rally, Trump repeated "We think we have it very well under control. We have very little problem in this country at this moment — five. ... we think it’s going to have a very good ending for it."
The following day, 1/31/20, Secretary Azar declared the virus a Public Health Emergency and the members of the coronavirus team layed out plans, threat level, etc.
Fauci: "The issue now with this is that there’s a lot of unknowns. As you can see just from the media, the number of cases have steeply inclined each and every day. You know that, in the beginning, we were not sure if there were asymptomatic infection, which would make it a much broader outbreak than what we’re seeing. Now we know for sure that there are."
On 1/31/20, the United States imposed modified travel restrictions on non-U.S. citizens coming from China (effective Feb. 2). Referring to his administration’s Jan. 31 order partially banning travel from China, Trump told Sean Hannity, “We pretty much shut it down coming in from China.” Restrictions applied only to foreign nationals traveling to the United States after visiting the People's Republic of China, with specific exemptions for travelers coming from the Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macao. US citizens and permanent residents were also exempt from the restrictions, and incoming flights did not stop landing at US airports until several weeks later.
On 2/5/20, one week after Navarro’s ominous warning, administration officials declined an offer of early congressional funding assistance during a meeting to discuss the coronavirus. The officials, including HHS’s Azar, said they “didn’t need emergency funding, that they would be able to handle it within existing appropriations.”
After the meeting, Senator Chris Murphy tweeted, “Just left the Administration briefing on Coronavirus. Bottom line: they aren't taking this seriously enough. Notably, no request for ANY emergency funding, which is a big mistake. Local health systems need supplies, training, screening staff etc. And they need it now.”
Although China is now the super villain, on 2/7/20, the administration assisted in airlifting nearly 18 tons of privately donated respirator masks, surgical masks, gowns and other medical supplies to China. (These were donations by private charities and public companies for Project HOPE, an international health-care organization that has been operating in Wuhan for a quarter-century and helped establish a nursing school there. Usually, donors to Project HOPE arrange for charter aircraft to take their donations overseas. The State Department’s role was providing the aircraft.)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/04/22/did-trump-ship-17-tons-american-masks-china/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/us-sent-millions-of-face-masks-to-china-early-this-year-ignoring-pandemic-warning-signs/2020/04/18/aaccf54a-7ff5-11ea-8013-1b6da0e4a2b7_story.html]
Throughout this time, Trump continued to suggest that the virus would be gone by April, even though his advisers warned him that much about the virus is still not known.
On 2/10/20, Trump submitted the 2021 budget proposal calling for a 9% reduction in CDC funding, although there is a modest increase for the division that combats global pandemics.
On 2/11/20, the WHO named the new disease COVID-19 and urged world leaders to give priority to containing the virus.
One day before Navarro’s second warning memo highlighting the needs for an "immediate supplemental appropriation of at least $3 billion" to support efforts at prevention, treatment, inoculation and diagnostics. It described expected needs for "Personal Protective Equipment" for health care workers and secondary workers in facilities such as elder care and skilled nursing. He estimated that over a four-to-six-month period, "We can expect to need at least a billion face masks, 200,000 Tyvek suits, and 11,000 ventilator circuits, and 25,000 PAPRs (powered air-purifying respirators)" Trump declared that “We pretty much shut it down coming in from China.”
The stock market reacted the next day, plummeting, the Dow Jones Industrials falling more than 1,000 points. Nonplused, that same day, Trump asked for $1.25 billion in emergency aid, growing to $8.3 billion in Congress. He tweets that the virus "is very much under control" and the stock market "starting to look very good to me!"
Tweet: "The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. We are in contact with everyone and all relevant countries. CDC & World Health have been working hard and very smart. Stock Market starting to look very good to me!"
The day after? Azar holds a press conference, states that “Thanks to the president and this team’s aggressive containment efforts,” the novel coronavirus “is contained.”
His cohort, Larry Kudlow, director of the US National Economic Council, joined CNBC's Kelly Evans to discuss the possible impact of the coronavirus on the US economy. “Coronavirus will not be economic tragedy”.
The Navarro memos would not come to light until early April, when Trump characteristically claimed not having seen them. "I don’t think it would’ve changed it, because I basically did what the memo said," Trump said, referring to his decision at the end of January to restrict travel from China. "I heard he wrote some memos talking about a pandemic," Trump said. "I didn't see them, I didn't look for them either." Interestingly, Trump's claims of the millions saved by his actions mirror the warnings in Navarro's memos.
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-says-he-never-read-looked-memo-warning-possible-coronavirus-pandemic-1496707
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/491669-trump-says-he-didnt-see-navarro-memos-but-would[nt-have-changed-course
So, it seems strange - not that Trump lies and obfuscates, we have plenty of history on that - but that anyone still gives these clowns any credence. To be sure, there are plenty of unclean hands in this mess, some of it negligence, some of it happenstance and the luck of the draw, but a lot of it just smarmy politics, Navarro and company being the latest evidence of that.
Navarro's claim that China sent a "weaponized virus" to target the US, while also referring to Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden as the "candidate of the Chinese Communist Party" is a hell of a leap from his first two memos. And, tellingly, his claim that "We were cruising along until the Chinese Communist Party basically hit us with that deadly virus, that weaponized virus" is not just an amazing brazen assertion, its something that obviously might have been added to his early warnings.
Navarro’s claims fly in the face of the credible studies and even the findings of our own intelligence agencies. In "The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2", published in Nature, researchers compared the genome with the seven other coronaviruses known to infect humans. "Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus". Our intelligence agencies agree with what it terms "the widespread scientific consensus" that the COVID-19 virus was "not man-made or genetically modified". While they left themselves some wiggle room by saying that they are investigating whether it emerged from a laboratory in Wuhan, months later and with Navarro’s comments burning up the news cycle, nothing.
The attack on China is just the latest blame-shifting and schizophrenic messaging from the White House. It has at times ballyhooed China’s efforts while at other times it has been the focus of its attacks. The White House shifts constantly between claims of surprise and victimhood.
But it was not China that in 2018, eliminated a key American public health position in Beijing that was intended to help detect disease outbreaks in one of the world’s most concentrated population centers or, for that matter any of the other budgetary moves that laid the foundation for catching us napping. And, if we were caught napping, it’s because we weren’t paying attention or didn’t care; It was not happening here. That’s China.
When China reported its first case in November 2019 their military’s National Center for Medical Intelligence warned of a contagion - assessed as a possibly “cataclysmic” event - sweeping through Wuhan. The report was briefed to the National Security Council, the Pentagon and the White House, although the Defense secretary, Mark Esper, denied any awareness of it.
Some few days into our new year, Dr. Gao Fu, head of China’s disease control agency, informs his U.S. counterpart, Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the CDC, in an emotional telephone call that the outbreak was growing out of control. That was followed two days after that with a WHO report that a "pneumonia of unknown cause" was occuring in Wuhan. China followed that up by immediately sending a genetic map of the viral DNA to the world community. Officials across Asia began to take heightened precautions ahead of the busy Lunar New Year travel season.
By Mid-January (and just a few days shy of Navarro’s first memo) Azar - responding to the reports that the US had its first case, making us the fifth country outside of China to report cases of the virus - assured Americans that “the U.S. government is prepared.” While coronavirus in Wuhan, China, was “potentially serious, he said, it "was one for which we have a playbook.”
That was followed the next day by Trump’s statements from Davos where he touted the economy as well as his recent trade agreements with Mexico and Canada, and China. During a lengthy interview he is asked about the Washington state virus case and whether he was worried that, like SARS, it could impact on the GDP and trade.
“No. Not at all. And-- we're-- we have it totally under control. It's one person coming in from China, and we have it under control. It's—going to be just fine. “Do you trust that we're going to know everything we need to know from China?”, he was asked.“I do. I do. I have a great relationship with President Xi. We just signed probably the biggest deal ever made. It certainly has the potential to be the biggest deal ever made.”
He followed that up by tweet: "It will all work out well....China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi!”
Meanwhile, on the other side of the planet, China was taking drastic measures, closing off the city of Wuhan. The rest, unfortunately, we know.
That an advisor to the President can make the outrageous claims that he doesn't "think [that] it's any coincidence that the first year that China had a down economy was the same year now that they're coming after us in all sorts of ways" or that "Joe Biden is the candidate of the Chinese Communist Party" shows just how far off the reality ledge these lunatics have fallen.
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