Take a Look at What Trump Was Doing as Thousands Died of COVID-19

PAR FOR THE COURSE

Nero fiddled; Trump golfs.

Elizabeth Hunt Brockway

Editorial Visual Director

Updated Dec. 01, 2020 11:40AM ET / Published Nov. 29, 2020 11:23AM ET

Over 30,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 since Election Day, according to data from the World Health Organization. Outgoing-President Donald J. Trump has spent at least nine of those days at his golf course, Trump National Golf Club in northern Virginia, hitting the green.

Some Republicans consider this to be a clear indicator that Trump is a man of confidence, who knows how to play it cool even as he loses his grip on power.

Others have dared to call his post-election behavior—golfing mixed with lots of ugly, cartoonish flailing in a desperate attempt to subvert the will of the voters who ousted him—embarrassing.

Yet, considering the staggering daily death tolls in this country due to the novel coronavirus during the month of November, a word like embarrassing fails to capture the grim reality.

More than 10 months since the outbreak began stateside, the administration has effectively embraced herd immunity, with some of the president’s advisers admitting defeat in the battle against the virus. Outbreaks in the White House have become routine.

Meanwhile, Trump is spending his weekends putting away.

But COVID-19 doesn’t cease its lethality on the weekend or holidays—even if weekends and holidays do sometimes delay updated tallies of the carnage.

In The Daily Beast’s continued effort to help visualize and put into perspective the human cost of life during this savage pandemic, what follows is a breakdown of the number of American lives lost due to COVID-19 each day the president has spent golfing since the election.