Cher Blasts Donald Trump Over His Coronavirus Response

Cher lashed out at Donald Trump in the early hours of Sunday morning in an angry tweet about the coronavirus pandemic. The iconic singer cited new projections for the death toll of the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S., putting the blame on Trump himself. She got a mixed response from her followers.

In her tweet, Cher was likely referring to research that came out earlier this month, predicting that the number of COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. would reach 300,000 by Dec. 1, 2020. According to a report by CNN Health, the prediction came from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. Cher felt it represented a failure on the part of the president, tweeting: “Does Anyone Really Believe trump’s Done His Best!?”

Many of Cher’s followers did not, as they let her know in retweets and replies to her post. One person wrote, “I believe Trump is actively trying to kill us,” while another added, “Why isn’t the entire country demanding his removal and imprisonment for negligent genocide, dereliction of duty, and crimes against humanity??”

Over the last four years, Cher has become one of Trump’s most prominent outspoken critics on social media. The singer has taken to frequent political commentary, calls for activism and discussing replacement candidates for some offices.

She is not the only one questioning Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, however. To many pundits, Trump had already failed Americans by the time the virus reached the U.S., having not taken some early precautions that would have saved lives. According to a report by Vox, Trump was getting briefed on the developing pandemic by his intelligence experts as early as January, yet he spent that time condemning the Chinese government without taking any action of his own.

Trump’s first move to try and stop the U.S. from catching the pandemic was to impose a limited travel ban on China on Jan. 31, despite the fact that the virus was well-established in other countries by then. At the time, Trump was still actively fighting his trade war with China.

This was too little, too late, as the U.S. had its first coronavirus death on Feb. 6. Since then, the U.S. has gone on to become one of the global epicenters of the virus, with difficulty sticking to preventative measures and, according to a report by Business Insider, comparatively less economic relief legislation than other countries.

At the time of this writing, the U.S. has had over 176,000 deaths related to the coronavirus, according to Johns Hopkins University. That is approximately 22 percent of the total COVID-19 deaths in the world, while the U.S. only has about 4 percent of the world’s population. Trump is expected to address the nation live from the White House about the pandemic on Sunday night.