April 1, 2020
Questioning anything he says is a sure way to piss off the President. We’ve seen it many times when a reporter directly quotes him saying the opposite of something he just said. It happened once again at Wednesday’s Coronavirus news briefing (partial transcript below) when PBS White House correspondent Yamiche Alcindor asked him about remarks he’d made recently on Fox TV.
In answering, he appeared to misspeak a couple of times, saying ‘generators‘ instead of ‘ventilators.’ But working in this White House means never correcting him because the #1 rule is he’s never wrong. Long story short, generators were shipped to New York instead of ventilators. In this modern retelling of The Emperor’s New Clothes it fell to NY Governor Andrew Cuomo to point out his error.
“What in the f*ck am I supposed to do with these generators? We need thousands of freaking ventilators! Or more! A lot more! We’re in the middle of a freaking pandemic here, not a godd*mn hurricane! Jesus Christ, I just can’t with this imbecile anymore. Send ventilators Big Guy. Take the generators down to your payola palace in Florida for next hurricane season.”
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Q Thank you, Mr. President. I have two questions. The first is, you’ve said repeatedly that you think that some of the equipment that governors are requesting, they don’t actually need. You said New York might need —
THE PRESIDENT: I didn’t say that.
Q — might not need 30,000.
THE PRESIDENT: I didn’t say that.
Q You said it on Sean Hannity’s, Fox News.
THE PRESIDENT: I didn’t say — come on. Come on.
Q You said that you might —
THE PRESIDENT: You know, why don’t — why don’t you people act — let me ask you: Why don’t you act —
Q You said some states —
THE PRESIDENT: Why don’t you act in a little more positive? It’s always trying to “get you.”
Q My question to you is —
THE PRESIDENT: “Get you. Get you.” And you know what? That’s why nobody trusts the media anymore. That’s why people —
Q My question to you is: How is that going to impact —
THE PRESIDENT: Excuse me. You didn’t hear me. That’s why you used to work for the Times and now you work for somebody else. Look, let me tell you something: Be nice. Don’t be threatening.
Q Mr. President, my question is —
THE PRESIDENT: Don’t be threating. Be nice. Go ahead.
Q My question is: How is that going to impact how you fill these orders for ventilators or for masks? Your views that —
THE PRESIDENT: It’s not going to impact.
Q They’re — you’re not going to — it’s not going to impact you at all?
THE PRESIDENT: We’re producing tremendous numbers of ventilators. We’re doing a great job on it. Mike Pence, our Vice President, has headed up the task force, which has been incredible, the job they’ve done. We have everybody in the White House working on it. We have — everybody in the country is working on this in one way or the other.
The fact is, we’ve done a great job of delivering. You’ve seen the biggest people in the business — I mean, there’s nobody even close to this group of people. We had a meeting at 3 o’clock. It lasted for a long time. It was a great meeting with the generals and with everybody else. And they have done a fantastic job.
I’m just saying this: If they’re holding — let me give you one example. We sent thousands of generators to New York. They were put into a warehouse — a New York warehouse — that happened to be located, interestingly, in Edison, New Jersey. They were given to New York, and we then went to other places, also giving thousands of ventilators. The people in New York never distributed the generators. We said, “Why didn’t you distribute them?” Now, you have to understand, they have New York people working in those warehouses. I knew they had them. So we said, “Why didn’t you distribute them?” I’m — I hope they’ve distributed them now. But maybe they didn’t need them so badly.
But just so you know, we’re all — you, me, everybody — we’re all on the same team. You know, when — when journalists get up — and you’re a journalist, a fine journalist —
Q I was quoting you directly from Sean Hannity
THE PRESIDENT: — when journalists get up and ask questions that are so threatening — we’re all on the same team.
Q I was quoting you directly from your interview with Sean Hannity.