The Trump campaign wants to get the president back in front of adoring crowds at the rallies he loves, where he can try and change the subject from the coronavirus crisis.
The pandemic has killed more than 92,000 people in the U.S. since the last time President Donald Trump stood before a rally audience -- March 2 in Charlotte, North Carolina -- and he's been asking why he can't get back on the road to campaign if he's safe to travel in his official capacity, reported Politico.
“He enjoys talking to his supporters at these patriotic events, and so the more he’s out there doing that, the better mood he’s going to be in," said Jason Miller, a senior adviser to the 2016 campaign. "That’s important in a presidential year.”
Even so, Miller conceded that placing the president among a throng of people during a deadly pandemic represented "a moonshot mission" for the campaign.
“The goal is to get as close to a traditional Trump event as possible as we’re entering the warmer months here without having to change too much,” Miller said.
The re-election campaign hopes to organize a series of virtual events for the president by the end of this month, but White House allies are worried that his official visits lack the showmanship his base craves and focuses too much on topics related to the pandemic.
“This is the greatest global crisis of our times, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other problems that the president is working on and areas where he’s made progress that he and his team want to show,” said Republican strategist Alex Schriver.
Trump's team hopes he can pivot to talking about economic recovery and highlight his actions on immigration, foreign policy and social issues, and his allies worry that he can't do that while touring, for example, a facility that makes personal protective equipment for frontline workers.
“The president and his team will take every opportunity to make this a forward-looking election," Schriver said, "where they can go out and say to all of the country, ‘Here’s what we are going to do on the other side of this crisis.’”
But those plans might be complicated by public opinion.
Twice as many GOP voters as Democrats told pollsters they would feel comfortable attending a political rally between now and the November election, but 51 percent of Republicans still say the COVID-19 pandemic made “much less likely” to take part in large gatherings such as that.