Audio By Carbonatix
Former President Barack Obama described President Donald Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic as “chaotic” in a conference call with former members of his administration, a source said on Saturday.
Obama has largely kept out of the fray even as Trump has blamed him and his Democratic administration for a variety of problems related to having sufficient supplies to battle the pandemic that has killed more than 75,000 Americans.
But in his call on Friday with 3,000 members of the Obama Alumni Association, people who served in his administration, Obama urged his supporters to get behind Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, who is trying to unseat Trump in the Nov. 3 election.
The contents of the call were first reported by Yahoo News. A source familiar with the call confirmed them to Reuters.
Obama said the election “is so important because what we’re going to be battling is not just a particular individual or a political party.”
“What we’re fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided, and seeing others as an enemy — that has become a stronger impulse in American life,” he said.
He said this is one reason why “the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty.”
“It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset — of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’ — when that mindset is operationalized in our government,” Obama said.
“That’s why, I, by the way, am going to be spending as much time as necessary and campaigning as hard as I can for Joe Biden,” he said.
Obama’s office declined to comment.
White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany said Trump’s response to the coronavirus “has been unprecedented” and has saved American lives.
She harked back to the Ukraine inquiry launched by Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives last year that led to House passage of articles of impeachment against Trump. The Republican-led Senate acquitted Trump early this year.
Latest Stories
-
Oil falls on increased Gulf supply and hopes for US-Iran talks
2 hours -
South Sudan’s Kiir dissolves government, clears hurdles to delayed election
2 hours -
Ntim Fordjour accuses government of failing to act on Ghana’s drug crisis
4 hours -
Autopsy shows Hayden Panettiere died from a drug overdose
4 hours -
Earl Spencer should pull Diana book from shelves, Piers Morgan says
4 hours -
IMF tells advanced economies to ‘bring debt down’ as borrowing costs rise
5 hours -
‘I have never felt heat like that’ – a survivor on watching 33 cellmates die in Nigeria
5 hours -
16 arrested, 4 printing hubs busted in major counterfeit currency crackdown
5 hours -
Sir Jim Ratcliffe suspends production at key UK plants blaming high gas prices
5 hours -
Major US outlets suspend shared Trump coverage in protest at media ban
5 hours -
Trump says he would back ban on diesel exports
6 hours -
Lekzy DeComic to feature four generations of comedians on upcoming show
6 hours -
Nigeria wins arbitration as Sunrise’s $400 million hydropower claim dismissed
6 hours -
Xhaka under investigation over Covid-19 certificate
6 hours -
FAW chief questions Infantino’s Fifa reform claims
6 hours