MSNBC's Joe Scarborough went off on a shouting rant against President Donald Trump's bungled response to the coronavirus outbreak that has killed thousands and shut down the U.S. economy indefinitely.
The "Morning Joe" host lamented that Trump and his administration wasted crucial weeks of preparation that eroded any advantages the United States could have had in fighting the pandemic, and he said the president was still failing his test of leadership.
"No country is better positioned to fight this pandemic, no country when you look at our technology, when you look at our medical superiority, when you look at our scientistic superiority, when you look at our resources -- richest country on earth," Scarborough said. "No country was better equipped to actually keep this virus at bay. Yet it is the United States, through the failure of the administration, that will end up having more cases and losing more lives than anybody else."
Scarborough agreed other leaders had failed to act soon enough, but he said the president's leadership was crucial in a national emergency.
"Because even up to a month ago, Donald Trump was mocking governors who were shutting down their government," he said. "Now, there's what about-ism. You can say, [Bill] de Blasio said this, [Andrew] Cuomo said that. That's great. Guess what? They're not running for president, they're not president, all right? You don't like what they said in March, early March, and if you're in New York, vote against them. I don't really care, has nothing to do with me. I care about the United States of America."
Scarborough's voice rose as he catalogued Trump's failures.
"When it comes to the United States of America, we had a president that did nothing but play down this threat for two months," he said. "We're bringing it up now because he is still acting reckless inside the White House. As we go into the worst week for this country, he's still acting reckless and unmoored, he still can't rise to the occasion in this, the darkest week that Americans will face probably since World War II."
