Chris Cuomo wonders why 'pro-life' Republicans 'allowed people to die' from coronavirus

Stephen Proctor
Updated ·4 min read

A day after tapes were released proving that President Trump knew more about the dangers of the coronavirus than he publicly let on, Chris Cuomo called out Republicans who identify as pro-life for not alerting the public. In the tapes, in which Trump spoke to Bob Woodward for his latest book, Rage, Trump talks about the virus being more deadly than the flu, but that he wanted to publicly downplay it.

In a recording from Feb. 7, Trump can be heard saying, “It goes, it goes through air, Bob. That’s always tougher than the touch. You know, the touch, you don’t have to touch things, right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed. And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than your, you know, your, even your strenuous flus. This is more deadly. This is 5 per-, you know, this is 5 percent versus 1 percent and less than 1 percent. You know, so, this is deadly stuff.”

In a recording from March 19, Trump tells Woodward, “I wanted to always play it down. I still like playing it down because I don’t want to create a panic.”

As the U.S. nears 200,000 COVID-related deaths, Cuomo questioned how Republicans who call themselves pro-life could have sat idly by as Trump misled the American public for so many months.

“Where is everybody else? Where are the voices out there who call themselves pro-life?” Cuomo asked. “Gotta protect it. That’s what my faith teaches us. The ones elected to keep checks and balances on the president. Country first, party second.”

Cuomo even called some of them out by name for their response to the Woodward tapes.

“Many GOP senators, conservative, moderate, (Susan) Collins, (Joni) Ernst, they won’t answer questions. They won’t answer any questions about the Woodward tapes,” Cuomo said. “(John) Cornyn said he wouldn’t comment since he didn’t have any confidence in the reporting. It is a tape, brother. The president doesn’t deny the tape. It’s the media’s fault? Sens. (David) Perdue and (Thom) Tillis, they defended Trump, along with the big kahuna himself, Mitch McConnell.”

Cuomo also pointed out that pro-life Republicans knew the real dangers of the coronavirus early on. This was evidenced by the actions of a couple Republican senators following a coronavirus briefing in late January. North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr sold stocks soon after the briefing and warned donors of the dangers. He stepped down as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee after his actions were exposed. Georgia Sen. Kelly Loeffler also sold stocks after the briefing, but insider trading charges against her were dropped by the Justice Department. As Trump continually misled the American public, like saying on multiple occasions that the coronavirus would magically disappear, Republicans refused to contradict him.

“They knew. They knew what he knew. These weren’t top secret briefings. They knew what he knew and they knew when he knew it,” Cuomo said. “And now you know what the president knew and when he knew it. And you know all of them didn’t tell you the damn truth and made people sick and it allowed people to die.”

Cuomo Prime Time airs weeknights at 9 p.m. on CNN.

Watch Trump claim ‘nobody had any idea’ the coronavirus was so deadly despite saying otherwise in the Woodward recording:

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