Tom Cotton shredded for claiming Trump kept America 'safe' while he was president

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) was raked over the coals on Friday by MSNBC columnist Michael A. Cohen, for his recent proclamation on social media that "When Donald Trump was president, America was safe, strong, and prosperous."

"This is a bit like asking Mary Todd Lincoln, 'Other than that, how was the play?'" wrote Cohen. The trouble is, "For those of us who were sentient in 2020 and remember the final months of Trump’s presidency, Cotton is leaving out something rather important — the coronavirus pandemic."

"In 2020, the US economy contracted by 3.5 percent, the largest decline since after World War II. From April onward, tens of thousands of Americans died every week from Covid," pointed out Cohen. "Millions more were stuck at home, unable to see friends and family. The basic rhythms of life were completely upended. 'Safe, strong, and prosperous' are not the three adjectives that most Americans would have used to describe the United States in 2020."

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Not all of this was Trump's doing — every country was hit hard by the pandemic. But, Cohen, argued, the former president certainly made it worse than it should have been. "He ignored the warning signs of a possible pandemic, even forbidding members of his administration from talking about it publicly. In fact, we now know from interviews released by The Washington Post’s Bob Woodward that Trump knew as early as February 2020 that Covid was 'deadly' but purposely played it down," he wrote. Meanwhile, he endorsed an unproven malaria drug treatment for the pandemic that had no curative effect, and held events where the virus could easily spread.

President Joe Biden has not been running on how he managed to bring the virus under control with hundreds of millions of shots in arms, wrote Cohen, probably because most of America just wants to forget the virus ever happened. But, he said, no one should forget Trump's role in worsening the crisis, as Cotton seems intent on.

"Much of the discussion about a second Trump presidency is focused on what he might do to undermine American democracy," concluded Cohen. "All that is important, but so, too, is reminding ourselves what actually happened when Trump was president — and how he handled the most significant crisis of his time in office. Yet, if current indications are any guide, it will largely be forgotten once the election rolls around — just like the virus itself."