Dr. Deborah Birx, the chief medical officer on the White House coronavirus task force, painted a rosy picture of the coronavirus pandemic for President Donald Trump that led to the mid-April decision to push for reopening, The New York Times reports. According to the Times, Birx believed the virus in the United States would follow the same pattern as it did in Italy, with a sharp peak and a gradual decline into negligible case numbers. She was, of course, wrong, as Americans did not follow shelter-in-place orders to the degree that Italians did, nor were such orders implemented nationwide. Birx would reportedly walk the halls of the White House in April to deliver news that the pandemic was, on the whole, fading and would continue to do so. On April 11 in the Situation Room, she informed the task force that the country was doing well with containing the virus and that mitigation efforts were succeeding. She also reportedly wrote the guidelines given to the president that described voluntary steps states could take to reopen safely. Since April, the Trump administration has pursued an agenda of abdicating responsibility in favor of letting governors decide which tacks to pursue, which White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows dubbed “state authority handoff.”
