Accompanying the enduring presence of COVID-19 on America’s collective political consciousness is President Donald Trump and his coronavirus task force. These daily briefings have been the primary source of information between the general public and the federal government on new developments and information about the coronavirus pandemic. Top government officials and scientific leaders have utilized this platform to update Americans on the ongoing response to the pandemic. Part of these updates, though, appear to stray entirely from the daily briefings’ intended purpose of dispersing information. The president is the primary source of these derailings, and his unpredictability has grown so disruptive that major journalistic outlets like ABC, CBS and NBC “have stopped airing the briefings” entirely on their main broadcast networks (AP News). Nothing exemplifies this series of inconsistencies more than a segment from his April 13th briefing, in which Trump showed a video contrasting media criticism of his response to the pandemic and a timeline showcasing the effectiveness of his responses. As indicated by a myriad of news outlets, the video was received not so much as genuinely insightful or helpful information in confronting the pandemic, but rather as propaganda to aggrandize the president (“Trump plays,” Guardian News).
The videos act as rebukes against the media outlets Trump has condemned throughout his presidency and as an argument against critics of his performance during this pandemic. Even so, their presence was not limited to just the prior two reasons. Trump proposed these videos as evidence of his accomplishments in response to the current pandemic; in other words, these videos were curated so Trump could continue maintaining his position as a symbol of Justice. In our current time, against a threat that is so indiscriminate in its destructive path -- it’s a virus that kills on the basis of finding a host rather than acting against any particular persons or with any agenda in mind -- it is difficult for the president to find an opponent upon which to serve Justice, a significant political figure to name-call or mock. Much of his presidential efforts to stay relevant and acknowledged has relied on human opposition, and because there isn’t a direct individual to enact a dramatic sense of revenge (for generating scrutiny against him and his fulfillment of his executive duties), this example sees him serving Justice against the press. He takes words from one of their own, The New York Times, and proves through his series of responses to provide aid and relief in the form of travel bans to affected countries. He proves them wrong, those individuals who would sow seeds of doubt in his avid followers (the American people) and therefore, Justice -- “[playing] up to the capacity for indignation of the public” -- is served (Barthes 92).
Trump’s relationship with major media and news platforms has been tenuous since his earliest times on the campaign trail, and these videos (and his subsequent defense of them) are only the latest examples of his continuing to punch back. This idea is most explicit in him, later in this same conference, defending the videos and therefore his administration’s efforts: “The problem is the press doesn’t cover [my efforts] the way it should” (“Trump plays,” Guardian News). His continued antagonism in this section of the briefing is no exception to this trend, but this incident alongside his continued deviance from salient coronavirus information only points to a continued reduction in coverage. Time is the only station through which any improvement in this relationship can be marked, and given the patterns in Trump’s performance so far, it’s unfortunate that predictions of a continued decline are made all the more clear.
Works Cited
Barthes, Roland. “The world of wrestling.” Culture and Society: Contemporary Debates, edited by Jeffery C. Alexander and Steven Seidman, Cambridge University Press, 1990, pp. 87-93.
Bauder, David. “To air or not air Trump briefings? Pressure on at networks.” AP News, 17 April 2020, https://apnews.com/a597ccdcf3e55e355b01354201f8aa4a.
“Trump plays campaign-style video attacking press at White House briefing.” YouTube, uploaded by Guardian News, 13 April 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=071YQ5u6Gcg.
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