Please Note
The Washington Post is providing this important information about the coronavirus for free. For more free coverage of the coronavirus pandemic, sign up for our Coronavirus Updates newsletter where all stories are free to read.
Until recently, Deborah Birx, the White House’s top coronavirus coordinator, enjoyed a good relationship with President Trump. But after five months of negative headlines, Trump has started to associate Birx with the government’s failed response to the pandemic, and the once-celebrated physician has been spending less time in Oval Office, two former administration officials told The Washington Post. Things came to a head on Monday, when Trump derided Birx as “pathetic” in a tweet, frustrated that she hadn’t expressed more optimism while delivering a grim warning about “extraordinary widespread” contagion over the weekend.
Later on Monday, Trump appeared to backtrack, saying he had “a lot of respect” for Birx.
A little more than 48,000 new cases and 524 fatalities were reported nationwide on Monday. The U.S. has reported upward of 4,689,000 cases and 152,000 deaths since February.
Here are some significant developments:
- As coronavirus outbreaks continue to ravage the Sun Belt, caseloads have been steadily creeping up in states that remained largely unaffected during the spring and early summer, with Missouri, Montana and Oklahoma seeing some of the largest gains in the past week. Southern states — including Florida, Mississippi and Alabama — continue to report some of the highest daily tallies overall.
- As Congress continued to engage in protracted negotiations over a new coronavirus relief bill on Monday, Trump said that he would consider using his executive powers to stop evictions and lower payroll taxes if a deal wasn’t reached.
- Arizona’s superintendent of public instruction said that it was “unlikely” that schools could safely reopen by Aug. 17, setting up a potential conflict with Gov. Doug Ducey (R), who has said that schools that don’t offer at least some in-person classes will lose out on funding.
- The University of Texas at Austin has banned both on and off-campus parties for the fall semester, though it’s unclear how those rules will be enforced.
- Seven St. Louis Cardinals players and six staff members have tested positive for covid-19, forcing Major League Baseball to postpone yet another series of games.
August 4, 2020 at 2:03 AM EDT
Eagles Coach Doug Pederson says he’s running the team ‘virtually’ after positive coronavirus test
Philadelphia Eagles Coach Doug Pederson said Monday that he is running the team from home while in quarantine after testing positive for the novel coronavirus.
The Eagles on Sunday night confirmed Pederson’s positive test in a written announcement and said he is “doing well.” Pederson said Monday during a conference call with reporters that he’s keeping his distance from his family members and wearing a mask at all times, and is still fully in charge of the team.
“I can still run the team virtually,” he said. “That’s what I was able to do. … I also want to reiterate the fact that I’m very comfortable and confident that the protocols we have in place are for the best interest of the football team. … It still is a very safe environment.”
By Mark Maske and Matt Bonesteel
August 4, 2020 at 1:21 AM EDT
‘Not handling the pandemic well’: Man fires at officers with AK-47 after refusing to wear a mask, police say
When a cigar shop clerk told Adam Zaborowski on Friday he had to wear a mask in the shop, the 35-year-old angrily refused. Instead, he grabbed two stogies, stormed outside — and then pulled a handgun and shot at the clerk, Bethlehem Township, Pa., police said.
The next day, cornered near his home, Zaborowski allegedly fired at police with an AK-47, sparking a wild shootout with at least seven officers that ended with him shot multiple times and under arrest.
The case is the latest violent incident tied to arguments over mandatory mask orders. But Zaborowski’s reaction was driven by his own intense difficulty with the pandemic, his attorney claimed; before the shootout, Zaborowski had lost his job and had also recently lost custody of his child.
By Tim Elfrink
August 4, 2020 at 1:02 AM EDT
World faces ‘generational catastrophe’ if school closures continue, U.N. chief warns
The world faces a “generational catastrophe” due to ongoing school closures, U.N. Secretary General António Guterres said Tuesday, calling the coronavirus pandemic “the largest disruption of education ever.”
Allowing students to safely return to classrooms must be a “top priority” as countries get local transmission under control, Guterres said in a video message released early Tuesday morning. As of mid-July, over 1 billion students in more than 160 countries were out of school, and more than 40 million children had stopped receiving education during the critical preschool year. Prolonging that pause “could waste untold human potential, undermine decades of progress, and exacerbate entrenched inequalities,” he said.
Guterres noted that parents, and particularly women, “have been forced to assume heavy care burdens in the home” as schooling moves online. Meanwhile, refugees, students with disabilities and people who live in remote areas are less likely to be able to access virtual instruction.
A policy brief released alongside Guterres’s message emphasizes that nations must “suppress transmission of the virus to control national or local outbreaks” before beginning to reopen schools, calling it “the single most significant step.”
By Antonia Farzan
August 4, 2020 at 12:25 AM EDT
Analysis: If Congress can’t pass this coronavirus legislation, is the institution broken?
The human suffering and loss caused by the novel coronavirus is most comparable to a major world war, some members of Congress and outside experts say.
Congress blew past a deadline Friday to give millions of Americans a continuation of much-needed extra unemployment benefits. And after a week of negotiating, the parties are still not close to a deal that leaders on both sides agree needs to happen. Each side blames the other.
Their inability to act at this moment of crisis raises the question, perhaps more than any other major legislative debate: Is Congress broken? The answer, according to some former and outgoing members of Congress in a new report, is: Maybe.
Read the analysis here.
By Amber Phillips
August 4, 2020 at 12:17 AM EDT
Cases are climbing in Midwest states with previously low infections
The novel coronavirus is surging in several Midwestern states that had not previously seen high infection rates while average daily deaths remained elevated Monday in Southern and Western states hit with a resurgence of the disease after lifting some restrictions earlier this summer.
Missouri, Montana and Oklahoma are among those witnessing the largest percentage surge of infections over the past week, while, adjusted for population, the number of new cases in Florida, Mississippi and Alabama still outpaced all other states, according to a Washington Post analysis of health data.
Experts also see worrying trends emerging in major East Coast and Midwest cities, and they anticipate major outbreaks in college towns as classes resume in August.
By Anne Gearan, John Wagner and Jacqueline Dupree
August 4, 2020 at 12:16 AM EDT
After months of favor, Birx raises Trump’s ire with grim coronavirus assessment
President Trump further disparaged his senior health advisers on Monday even as the pandemic deepened its hold on the nation, as the White House’s top coronavirus coordinator, Deborah Birx, joined Anthony S. Fauci and other scientists on the receiving end of the president’s ire.
Birx — who built a career leading public health efforts against HIV/AIDS — quickly garnered Trump’s favor earlier this year for publicly championing the administration’s coronavirus response, becoming a prominent figure both inside and outside the White House.
But she soon lost support within swaths of the scientific and medical community for seeming to minimize the virus and to enable Trump’s overly rosy view of the pandemic. This past weekend, Birx lost the backing of the nation’s top Democrat, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.), who privately called Birx “the worst” and publicly said she had no confidence in her.
And finally on Monday morning, Birx appeared to lose ground with perhaps her most important constituency, Trump himself, who dismissed her as “pathetic.”
By Ashley Parker, Josh Dawsey and Yasmeen Abutaleb
