John Oliver slams Trump's handling of coronavirus: 'A callous indifference to human life'

Stephen Proctor
Updated ·3 min read

As the number of coronavirus cases in the U.S. continues to multiply, John Oliver once again ripped President Donald Trump’s handling of the outbreak on Sunday night, particularly concerning the Grand Princess cruise ship parked off the coast of California with 21 confirmed cases of the virus. The ship will dock in the Port of Oakland on Monday, but on Friday while visiting the CDC, Trump said he’d like for those on board to stay on the ship so they won’t cause the number of cases in the U.S. to go up.

“I would rather, because I like the numbers being where they are, I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship,” Trump said, adding, “I would rather have the numbers stay where they are. But if they want to take them off, they’ll take them off. But if that happens, all of a sudden your 240 is obviously going to be a much higher number, and probably the 11 will be a higher number, too.”

“Yeah, it will,” Oliver responded. “But you get that those numbers are also people, right? And that things that happen on boats still count, right?”

Oliver then pointed out that leaving the people on the ship would likely only make things worse, as happened in Japan.

“If Trump had gotten his way and we had left people on board indefinitely, the infection would have likely spread more,” Oliver said. “I would say it’s impossible to have such a callous indifference to human life, but he does seem to have a natural ability for it.”

Oliver also took issue with Trump continually contradicting known facts when it comes to the coronavirus. Despite a massive shortage of testing kits, Trump said on Friday that anyone who wants to get tested can get tested.

“Anybody that needs a test gets a test,” Trump said. “They’re there. They have the tests, and the tests are beautiful.”

“Set aside how weird it is to call a test for a deadly disease beautiful,” Oliver said, “the fact is, what he just said is flagrantly untrue. There are currently not enough available tests, and you can’t just state something as a fact because you wish it was true.”

Last Week Tonight airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO.

Watch John Oliver rip Trump for downplaying the coronavirus: ‘You can’t just ignore real numbers’:

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