Trump will ‘pay a terrible price’ in November’s election over coronavirus and Black Lives Matter, professor predicts

President Donald Trump’s response to the coronavirus crisis and widespread protests over racial injustice have landed him “in big trouble” ahead of November’s election, according to one politics expert.

Speaking to CNBC’s “Street Signs Europe” on Friday, Inderjeet Parmar, professor of International Politics at City University, said Trump had been given two political gifts — but had squandered both.

“The pandemic, deadly as it has turned out to be, was a chance for him to unite the country, to rise above the political factionalism, and effectively act as the president of the United States in a period of emergency,” Parmar said.

“He didn’t do it, and he’s in big trouble because of that … President Trump has made his bed, and I think in the end he’s going to pay a terrible price, and that price is already being paid by a very large number of American people, both in terms of their health, and also in terms of the economy.”

A spokesperson for the White House was not immediately available to comment when contacted by CNBC.

There have been more than 2.7 million confirmed cases of Covid-19 and 128,740 fatalities from the virus in the U.S., according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. has recorded the highest number of infections and the most deaths due to the coronavirus in the world.

The nationwide protests sparked by the police killing of George Floyd had also seen Trump fail to offer “anything in regard to any kind of significant sympathy,” Parmar added.

“I think what he’s shown is when it comes to real emergencies, when you need real leadership, he actually doesn’t have any of that kind of quality,” he said. “He talks about the people but he doesn’t appear to know the people’s interests lie in their economic wellbeing and their physical and personal safety.”

Article source: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/03/trump-in-trouble-over-coronavirus-black-lives-matter-expert.html