冠状病毒病例汹涌澎湃在全国范围内，唐纳德·特朗普总统继续怀疑卫生官员以及他自己的政府对大流行的反应，导致他的一些忠实支持者不仅质疑专家的建议，还质疑病毒本身的存在。
自从病毒出现的早期，总统一再淡化它的影响，承诺它会"消失"错误地将其与季节性流感多次戴口罩，直到大流行的几个月，甚至嘲笑政治对手谁穿的。
作为回应，热情的支持者回应了总统在病毒问题上观点的转变，根据在最近的竞选活动中和全国范围内对十几名特朗普支持者的采访，从无视联邦指导方针拒绝戴口罩，到完全不相信已经导致13万多名美国人死亡的病毒。
来自新罕布什尔州匹兹堡市的特朗普的忠实支持者文尼·斯卡尼西(Vinny Scarnisi)说:“在我看来，COVID不过是一条试图利用的途径，我只是在为自己说话，试图让总统下台。”
“这是洗脑。没有理由害怕。绝对不是。这是个玩笑。”
在这段视频截图中，文尼·斯卡尼斯和娜塔莎·雅典带着他的女儿出现在新罕布什尔州朴茨茅斯被取消的特朗普集会场地外广播公司新闻
斯卡尼斯质疑冠状病毒威胁的言论是在美国死亡人数持续上升、病例在全国范围内激增以及热点地区的医院接近饱和之际发表的。
周一，总统利用他的庞大平台再次对他自己的政府对病毒的反应播下了怀疑的种子，延续了一种困扰该县大流行努力的模式。
游戏节目主持人查克·伍尔利向特朗普的8000多万粉丝转发了一条帖子，声称“每个人都在撒谎”包括命名联邦疾病控制和预防中心、媒体、民主党人，甚至医生，以损害他的连任机会。
新闻秘书凯丽·麦克纳尼(Kayleigh McEnany)在为总统的推文辩护时表示，特朗普确实对疾控中心有信心，但他的意图是表达他对“流氓个人过早泄露指南”的不满
麦克纳尼说:“推文的目的是指出这样一个事实，即当我们使用科学的时候，我们必须以一种非政治性的方式来使用它。”
特朗普竞选团队没有回应置评请求。
最离谱的谎言是关于乔维奇19号的。每个人都在撒谎。疾控中心、媒体、民主党、我们的医生，不是所有人，而是大多数人，我们被告知要信任他们。我认为这一切都是关于选举和阻止经济复苏，这是关于选举。我受够了。
——查克·伍尔利(@查克·伍尔利)2020年7月13日
普林斯顿大学(Princeton University)历史学教授凯文·m·克鲁斯(Kevin M. Kruse)表示，尽管许多美国人通常会从自己政党的领导人那里形成政治立场，但这种影响“在特朗普总统更强大的支持者身上尤其明显。”
克鲁斯告诉美国广播公司新闻:“他们肯定从总统本人那里得到他们的感觉，什么是对的，什么是错的，什么是真的，什么是假的。”“我认为，总统就危机的严重性、包括他自己的疾病控制中心和福西医生在内的医疗当局的可靠性以及戴口罩的功效发出的各种信号，在他们心中都受到了质疑，因为总统对他们产生了如此多的怀疑。”
克鲁斯说，一些总统最坚定的支持者倾向于相信特朗普所说的话，遵循总统的历史模式和他们的核心基础。然而，他说，总统的影响力在特朗普时代被放大了。
“我不认为我们见过他们拒绝所有其他权威的程度。”甚至是他们以前信任的人。当涉及到总统和其他人的时候，他们会站在总统一边。”
民调显示，在戴口罩抗击病毒方面存在高度的党派分歧，根据一项调查，共和党人戴口罩的可能性远低于民主党人，分别为36%和94%盖洛普民意测验周一发布。
美国领先的传染病专家安东尼·福奇博士告诉《第五三光》杂志，冠状病毒反应周围的超人工环境使得对抗病毒更加困难。
Fauci说:“当你在某件事情上不能达成一致时，你就不能有效地处理它。”“因此，我认为你必须假设，如果没有这样的分歧，我们将有一个更协调的方法。”
总统的许多支持者呼应了特朗普全年用来淡化疫情的特定语言，包括他称病毒为“民主党”“新骗局”二月份在南卡罗来纳州的一次集会上，他提到他的对手是如何“将冠状病毒政治化的。”
“大流行是一个骗局——一个骗局。91岁的沃伦·戈达德(Warren Goddard)在新罕布什尔州朴茨茅斯参加了特朗普的集会，他说，“我一分钟都不相信。”取消。
戈达德告诉美国广播公司新闻，他计划参加集会，但不打算戴口罩，也没有在整个大流行期间戴口罩。
“我得不到病毒。这不是保护，”戈达德说，并补充说，他不相信面具会阻止他生病。
在这个视频截图中，沃伦·戈达德和他的女儿在新罕布什尔州朴茨茅斯市被取消的特朗普集会地点外广播公司新闻
他来自康涅狄格州的女儿玛格丽特·贝科特(Margaret Becotte)也表示，她没有戴口罩，但确实有一个纪念“特朗普2020”的口罩。
她说:“我不认为这有任何好处，以保护你从任何事情。”“这是一块不起作用的布。什么都没有……我的孩子不会戴那个面具的。”
贝科特称医学专家的建议是“有争议的”，他们说防止病毒传播的最好方法之一是戴口罩，并说她不会支持强制要求戴口罩的企业，因为这侵犯了她的权利。
“如果他们让我离开，我就再也不会和他们做生意了，因为这是我的宪法权利，我可以为自己的身体和我想做的事情做出选择。”
几周前，总统在俄克拉荷马州塔尔萨市的最后一次集会上，77岁的佩吉·里斯(Peggy Reeser)说，她参加了一个大型的室内活动，在被问及为什么要冒险时，她告诉ABC新闻，“我认为(特朗普)值得。”
大卫·安格尔和里斯一起参加了集会，他称COVID-19是一种“魔法病毒”，并说他戴面具只是为了“激怒别人。”安格尔说:“比起冠状病毒，我更担心开车或心脏病发作。”
另一位参加塔尔萨集会的人，76岁的Gisela Soliday说，她并不担心病毒，因为她不相信所报告的死亡人数是准确的，并反复试图将COVID-19与流感进行比较。
2020年7月11日，唐纳德·特朗普总统戴着面具参观位于马里兰州贝塞斯达的沃尔特·里德国家军事医疗中心。亚历克斯·埃德尔曼/法新社
自大流行开始以来，特朗普定期出现在摄像机前，参加白宫冠状病毒工作队每日一次的简报会，从不戴口罩，并一再淡化其必要性。
直到7月11日，当总统参观沃尔特·里德国家军事医疗中心时，人们才看到他在公共场合戴口罩。在那里，每个人都必须戴口罩。
特朗普在佛罗里达州的一名支持者在4月份接受美国广播公司采访时表示，她拒绝戴口罩，因为总统现在没有戴口罩。她说，在沃尔特·里德医院看到他戴口罩后，她会戴口罩。
“如果他决定穿一件，那就意味着这件事越来越严重了。来自佛罗里达州劳德代尔堡的金伯利·洛夫在被问及看到特朗普戴着面具是否会影响她戴上面具时说:“我还没有穿过，但我现在会穿过。”
爱还说，一段时间以来，她一直带着一张声称她不必戴面具的假卡的截图。
As Trump sends mixed messages on coronavirus, some loyal supporters cling to conspiracy theories
With coronavirus casessurgingaround the country, President Donald Trump has continued tocast doubt on health officialsand his own administration’s response to the pandemic, leading some of his fiercely loyal supporters to question not only advice from experts but the existence of the virus itself.
Since the early days of the virus, the president hasrepeatedly downplayedits impact, promised it would"disappear,"incorrectly compared it to theseasonal flumultiple times and bucked wearing a mask until months into the pandemic, evenmocking political opponentswho did wear them.
In response, ardent supporters have echoed the president’s shifting views on the virus, ranging from refusing to wear a mask despite federal guidelines, to out-right not believing in a virus that has left over 130,000 Americans dead, according to interviews with over a dozen Trump supporters at recent campaign events and around the country.
"COVID is nothing but an avenue to try to take, in my opinion, and I'm just speaking for myself, to try to take the president out," said loyal Trump supporter Vinny Scarnisi, of Pittsburg, New Hampshire.
"It’s a brainwashing. There's no reason to be scared. Absolutely not. It’s a joke."
Scarnisi’s words questioning the threat of the coronavirus come as the death toll continues to rise in the United States, cases swell across the country and as hospitals in hotspots approach capacity.
On Monday, the president used his massive platform to again sow doubt in his own administration's response to the virus, continuing a pattern that’s plagued the county’s pandemic efforts.
Trump retweeted a post to his over 80 million followers by game show host Chuck Woolery claiming"everyone is lying"about the pandemic, including naming the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the media, Democrats, and even doctors, to damage his reelection chances.
Defending the president’s tweet, press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said Trump does have confidence in the CDC but his intent was to express his displeasure with "rogue individuals leaking guidelines prematurely."
"The notion of the tweet was to point out the fact that, when we use science, we have to use it in a way that is not political," McEnany said.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
The most outrageous lies are the ones about Covid 19. Everyone is lying. The CDC, Media, Democrats, our Doctors, not all but most ,that we are told to trust. I think it's all about the election and keeping the economy from coming back, which is about the election. I'm sick of it.
— Chuck Woolery (@chuckwoolery)July 13, 2020
While it's commonplace for many Americans to form political stances from their party's leader, Kevin M. Kruse, professor of history at Princeton University, says that influence is "especially true in the case of the stronger supporters of President Trump."
"They definitely take their sense of what is right and what is wrong, what is true and what is fake, from the president himself," Kruse told ABC News. "I think the mixed signals the president has given on the severity of the crisis, on the reliability of medical authorities, including his own CDC and Dr. Fauci, and the efficacy of wearing masks, has all been called into question in their mind because the president has cast so much doubt on them."
Kruse says some of the president’s most steadfast supporters are inclined to believe and trust what Trump says, following the historical pattern of presidents and their core bases. However, he says, presidential influence is amplified in the Trump era.
"I don't think we've ever seen it quite to this degree where they've rejected all other authorities. Even ones they previously trusted. When it comes down to the president versus anyone else they side with the president."
Polling points to a highly partisan divide when it comes to wearing a mask to combat the virus, with Republicans far less likely to wear one than Democrats, 36% to 94%, respectively, according to aGallup pollreleased on Monday.
And Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation's leading infectious disease expert, told FiveThirtyEight that the hyperpartisan environment around the coronavirus response has only made combating the virus more difficult.
"When you don’t have unanimity in an approach to something, you’re not as effective in how you handle it," Fauci said. "So I think you’d have to make the assumption that if there wasn’t such divisiveness, that we would have a more coordinated approach."
Many of the president's supporters echo specific language Trump has used to downplay the pandemic throughout the year, including when he called the virus Democrats''new hoax'at a rally in South Carolina back in February, at the time referring to how his rivals were "politicizing the coronavirus."
"The pandemic is a hoax -- a hoax. I don't believe that for a minute," said 91-year-old Warren Goddard, who showed up to Trump’s rally in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, only to find that it had beencanceled.
Goddard told ABC News that he planned on going inside the rally but wasn’t going to be wearing a face mask and hasn’t been wearing one throughout the pandemic.
"I can’t get the virus. It’s not protection," Goddard said, adding that he doesn’t believe that a mask would keep him from getting sick.
His daughter from Connecticut, Margaret Becotte, also says she does not wear a mask, but did have a souvenir "Trump 2020" mask.
"I don’t feel that this does any good to protect you from anything," she said. "This is a piece of cloth that does nothing. Nothing at all… My children will not wear that mask."
Becotte called the advice from medical experts, who say one of the best ways to prevent the spread of the virus is to wear a mask, "controversial" and says she won’t support businesses that mandate wearing a mask because it infringes on her rights.
"I will never do business with them again if they asked me to leave because it's my constitutional right to make my choice for my body, and what I want to do."
A few weeks back at the president’s last rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Peggy Reeser, 77, said she was attending the large-scale in-door event with full knowledge that at her age put her in a high-risk demographic, telling ABC News "I think [Trump] is worth it" when asked why she was taking the risk.
David Angle, who attended the rally with Reeser, called COVID-19 a "magic virus" and said he only wore his mask to "piss people off." "I’m more worried about driving my car or having a heart attack than the coronavirus," Angle said.
Another Tulsa rally attendee, Gisela Soliday, 76, said she wasn’t worried about the virus because she didn’t believe the number of deaths being reported was accurate and repeatedly tried to compare COVID-19 to the flu.
Since the start of the pandemic, Trump regularly appeared in front of cameras for once-daily White House Coronavirus Task Force briefings, never wearing a mask and repeatedly downplaying their necessity.
It wasn’t until July 11 that the president was seen wearing one in public when he visited Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, where it is required for everyone to wear a mask.
A Trump supporter in Florida who told ABC News in April that she refused to wear a mask because the president wasn’t wearing one now says she’ll wear a mask after seeing him wear one at Walter Reed.
"If he's decided to wear one then that means that this is getting really serious. I have not worn one yet, but I will be wearing one now," Kimberly Love, from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, said when asked if seeing Trump in a mask swayed her to start wearing one.
Love also said for a period of time she had been carrying around a screenshot of a bogus card that claims she doesn't have to wear a mask.
