Donald Trump furious: called Anthony Fauci an "idiot" and threatened to fire him

10/19/2020 2:36 PM

• Clarín.com

• World

Updated 10/19/2020 2:36 PM

US President Donald Trump on

the country's leading epidemiologist,

, an

and threatened to fire him a day after that expert commented in an interview that he was not "at all" surprised that the president will be infected with coronavirus.

In a call with his electoral campaign team to which several journalists had access,

to an interview broadcast this Sunday by the CBS network, in which Fauci criticized the massive acts that the president has given in the middle of the pandemic and his aversion to recommending the use of masks.

"People are tired of the covid.

, these idiots who did not hit (in their forecast). Every time (Fauci) appears on television there is always a bombshell, but it would be a even bigger bomb if I fire him, "Trump said, according to the media present.

"Fauci is a disaster

. If he had listened to him, we would have 500,000 dead" from covid, added the president, who later commented that he hoped there would be journalists listening to the call to spread what he had said.

Trump hinted that he is not seriously considering firing Fauci for the scandal that would entail,

at the helm of the US National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) for

and is quite a nonpartisan institution, which has advised six American presidents.

Tensions

However,

since the pandemic began, and Fauci has often felt compelled to qualify or contradict Trump's statements during the press conferences of the White House team against the coronavirus.

In his interview this Sunday with the CBS program "60 minutes", Fauci said he was

that Trump contracted covid-19 after seeing the act in which he nominated a new judge for the Supreme Court Amy Coney Barrett, attended by dozens of people without a mask at the White House.

"I was worried that he was going to get infected when I saw him in

, with crowded people, without separation, and in which almost no one was wearing a mask. When I saw him on TV, I said: 'Oh my God, nothing can come out good about that '(...) and it ended up being a source of super contagion, "said the expert.

The epidemiologist criticized that Trump

but assured that he believes that "deep down, (the president) believes in science."

He also expressed frustration that Trump's re-election campaign included in an ad a phrase from Fauci, taken out of context, in which the expert seemed to praise the president's handling of the pandemic.

"I do not publicly endorse any political candidate,

and I never will. And they go and put me in a campaign ad. I found it outrageous. I was referring to something else entirely, the exhausting work of the team" charged with coping. to the pandemic, explained the official.

Source: EFE

PB

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