First son Donald Trump Jr. said on Fox and Friends on Friday that Democrats are hoping for the coronavirus to come to the U.S. to slow down Trump’s reelection. 

“Anything that they can use to try to hurt Trump, they will… But for them to try to take a pandemic and seemingly hope that it comes here, and kills millions of people so that they could end Donald Trump‘s streak of winning, is a new level of sickness. You know, I don’t know if this is coronavirus or Trump derangement syndrome, but these people are infected badly,” Trump said.

Vice President Mike Pence, who’s been recently appointed to respond to the coronavirus, defended Trump Jr. on Sunday. “When you see voices on our side pushing back on outrageous and irresponsible rhetoric on the other side, I think that’s important, and I think it’s justified,” he said on NBC News’ Meet the Press. 

In an analysis by CNN, Chris Cillizza called the first son irresponsible, adding, “What he is conflating is the Democratic criticism of the Trump administration for both a lack of preparedness and a lack of seriousness in terms of public statements about the threat posed by coronavirus with, somehow, Democrats rooting for Americans to die en masse.”

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Trump has been criticized for downplaying the virus’ severity and for claiming it would simply die down once the weather warms. 

CHECK CURRENT DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY DELEGATE TOTALS HERE!

Currently, there are at least 76 confirmed cases in the United States and more than 86,000 confirmed cases worldwide.

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