The GOP has mutated from party that hampers efforts to control coronavirus to actively accelerating it: op-ed

In an op-ed for The Week this Tuesday, Ryan Cooper argues that the Republican Party is now "objectively pro-coronavirus."

Cooper cites the example of GOP Senator Mike Lee of Utah, who appeared in person at the Amy Coney Barrett hearings 10 days after testing positive for coronavirus. "In one particularly ghoulish moment, both Lee and [Lindsey Graham -- who refuses to get tested] stood chatting over Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who is 87 years old (and has also refused to get tested)."

"The hearing was just one of several instances over the past couple weeks in which Republicans have worked assiduously to spread coronavirus across the land," Cooper writes. "The party has mutated from merely hampering efforts to control the pandemic to actively accelerating it, even among their own top leaders."

According to Cooper, it's very possible that hundreds of infections will end up being caused by the failure to "find and arrest the chain of transmission" that started at the super-spreader event at the White House celebrating Barrett's nomination on September 26.

According to the CDC, anyone who tests positive for the virus is supposed to isolate themselves for a minimum 10 days, and longer if they still show symptoms.

"Lee and Trump violated the first CDC rule, and Graham is violating the second one," Cooper writes. "One hopes that nobody else will be infected as a result of the Barrett hearings, but it is quite possible that this will be the second super-spreader event directly associated with the Supreme Court nomination."

Read the full article over at The Week.