As the coronavirus spreads all over the country, President Donald Trump continues to give press conferences. When award-winning PBS reporter Yamiche Alcindor decided to hold him accountable for his role in the now pandemic, Trump said she asked a “nasty question.”
Alcindor said, "You said that you don’t take responsibility but you did disband the White House pandemic office and the officials that were working in that office left this administration abruptly, so what responsibility do you take for that? And the officials that worked in that office said the White House lost, wasted valuable time because the office was disbanded — what do you make of that?"
Trump called her question “nasty,” saying, "I just think it’s a nasty question because what we’ve done is — and Tony [Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases] has said numerous times that we’ve saved thousands of lives because of the quick closing. And when you say me — I didn’t do it, we have a group of people I could, I could ask perhaps in this administration that... I could perhaps ask Tony about that because I don’t know anything about it.”
He continued, “I mean, you say you say we did that, we’re spending — I don’t know anything about it. It’s the administration, perhaps they do that, people let people go. You used to be with a different newspaper than you are now. You know, things like that happen."

Watch the bizzare exchange below:

Snopes.com, a credible fact-checking site, reports, “Trump administration axed the executive branch team responsible for coordinating a response to a pandemic and did not replace it.”

According to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University, at least 1,663 people in the United States are infected with the coronavirus. The number is more than likely higher but the Trump administration’s testing failures has limited medical professionals on the frontlines of the virus. 

For the latest on the coronavirus, contact your local health department and visit the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website.