President open to investigating DeJoy campaign fundraising
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Monday expressed openness for an investigation into Louis DeJoy, the postmaster general he appointed, who is facing scrutiny after employees of his private company said they felt pressured to make donations to Republican candidates for which they were reimbursed.
In a Labor Day news conference, when asked whether he was open to an investigation into possible campaign finance violations by DeJoy, Trump said, “Sure, sure, let the investigations go.” And he also said DeJoy should lose his job “if something can be proven that he did something wrong.”
The president was responding to questions about a recent Washington Post report, which found that during DeJoy’s decade as chief executive of New Breed Logistics, employees said they were urged by DeJoy and his top aides to contribute to GOP candidates and then were reimbursed through bonuses — a practice that would be unlawful.
Trump, however, also offered tepid support of DeJoy, saying he did not know much about the Post’s story, and twice calling DeJoy “a very respected man.”
Since being appointed the head of the U.S. Postal Service, DeJoy has come under additional scrutiny for his cost-cutting measures that critics say are wreaking chaos and delays on the nation’s post offices, and prompting accusations of political bias — especially after Trump threatened to block USPS funding to limit its ability to process ballots for the November election.
In his wide-ranging 45-minute news conference, Trump also weighed in on the progress of a coronavirus vaccine and his relationship with the nation’s military, which has recently come under renewed criticism after an Atlantic article detailing Trump’s denigration of the troops and military service generally. According to the Atlantic’s reporting, the president dismissed Americans who died in war as “losers” and “suckers.”
Trump said his administration will end the coronavirus pandemic through Operation Warp Speed, which seeks to produce a vaccine in record time, though his stated timeline clashes with those described by experts in his administration. The president said a vaccine could come “during the month of October,” the month before Election Day, which could have tremendous positive consequences for Trump’s reelection hopes.
“The vaccine will be very safe and very effective, and it’ll be delivered very soon,” Trump said. “You could have a very big surprise coming up.”
However, many experts in Trump’s own administration have cautioned that such a rapid timeline seems overly optimistic. The lead scientific adviser for Operation Warp Speed told NPR that a vaccine for the virus was “possible but very unlikely” to be available by October or November.
Former Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Scott Gottlieb told CNN’s Face the Nation on Sunday that a vaccine for widespread use probably will come next year. If a vaccine were created before the end of 2020, it probably would be used for targeted populations, such as health care workers and nursing home residents, Gottlieb said.
When pressed, Trump also used the news conference to push back on the Atlantic story, calling it “a hoax.”
The president had previously used harsh language against the late John McCain, R-Ariz. — who had been a prisoner of war in Vietnam and whose family has a long tradition of serving in the military — saying in 2015 that the Republican senator from Arizona was a “loser” and that he prefers “people who weren’t captured.”
But Trump said his animosity toward McCain was long-standing and philosophical, and should not be viewed as evidence that he as commander in chief does not respect the troops.