Trump goes after Fauci, tries to buck up his team

P R E S C O T T , A r i z . — P r e s i d e n t D o n a l d T r u mp came out swinging Monday at Dr. Anthony Fauci, the press and polls that show him trailing Democrat Joe Biden in key battleground states in a disjointed closing message two weeks out from Election Day

On the third day of a western campaign swing, Trump was facing intense pressure to turn around his campaign, hoping for the type of l ast- minute surge that gave him a comef r o m- b e h i n d v i c t o r y f o u r years ago. But his inconsistent message, the newly rising virus cases and his attacks on experts l i ke Fauci could undermine his final efforts to appeal to voters outside his most loyal base.

Still Trump insisted he was confident as he executed an aggressive t r avel s chedule despite the pandemic.

“We ' r e g o i n g t o w i n , ” he t ol d c a mpaign s t a f f on a morning conference cal l

from Las Vegas. He went on to acknowledge: “I wouldn't have told you that maybe two or three weeks ago,” referring to the days when he was hospitalized with COVID-19.

See k i ng t o s hor e up t he morale of his staff, Trump blasted his government's own scientific experts as too negative, even as his handling of the pandemic that has killed nearly 220,000 Americans r e mains a c e ntr a l i s s ue t o voters.

“People are tired of hearing Fauci and all these i diots,” Trump said of the government's top infectious disease expert. “Every time he goes on television, there's always a bomb. But there's a bigger bomb i f you f i r e hi m. But Fauci's a disaster.”

A t a r a l l y i n P r e s c o t t , Arizona, Trump assailed Biden for pledging to heed the advice of scientific experts, saying di s missivel y t hat hi s r i val “wants to listen to Dr. Fauci.”

T h e d o c t o r i s b o t h respected and popular, and Trump's rejection of scientific advice on the pandemic has already drawn bipartisan condemnation.

At hi s r a l l y, Trump a l s o r a mped u p h i s a t t a c k s o n the news media, singling out NBC's Kristen Welker, t he moderator of the next presid e nt i a l d e b a t e , a s wel l a s CNN for aggressively coveri ng a pandemic that i s now infecting tens of thousands of Americans every day.

Fauci, in an interview with CBS's “60 Minutes” that aired Sunday, said he was not surprised that Trump contracted the virus after he held a series of large events with few face coverings. Fauci also objected to the president's campaign using his words in a campaign ad.

“I was worried that he was going to get sick when I saw him in a completely precarious situation of crowded, no separation between people, a nd a l most nobody wearing a mask,” Fauci said of the president.

Trump's comments drew a d e f e n s e o f F a u c i f r o m Tennessee GOP Sen. Lamar Alexander, who praised the doctor as one of the nation's “most distinguished public servants.”

As Trump turned his flouting of scientific advice into a c a mpaign a ppl a use l i ne, Alexander added that, if more Americans had heeded Fauci's advice, “we'd have fewer cases of COVID-19, and it would be safer to go back to school and back to work and out to eat.”

Bi d e n was o f f t h e c a mpaign trail on Monday ahead of Thursday's s e c ond a nd fi nal debate. His campaign praised Fauci while saying that “Trump's reckless and negligent leadership threatens to put more lives at risk.”

“Trump's closing message in the final days of the 2020 race is to publicly mock Joe Biden for trusting science and to call Dr. Fauci, the l eading public health official on COVID- 19, a ` disaster' and other public health officials `idiots,'” the campaign said. “Trump is mocking Biden for listening to science. Science.”

In his call with campaign s t a f f e r s b e f o r e r a l l i e s i n Prescott and Tucson, Trump urged his supporters to work as hard as possible during the race's final stretch.

“Get off this phone and work your asses off,” he told campaign organizers.

Monday's professed conf i dence i n victory stood i n contrast to some of Trump's ot her publi c c omments i n recent days reflecting on the prospect that he could lose.

“Could you imagine if I lose my whole l i f e? What am I going to do?” he asked a rally cr owd i n Macon, Georgia. “I'm not going to feel so good. Maybe I'll have to leave the country. I don't know.”

I n J a nesvil l e , Wisconsin over t he weekend, he s ai d wasn't “even conceivable” that he could lose to a man he labeled “the worst candidate ... in the history of presidential politics.”

Trump has also expressed confusion about polling data t hat s hows him t r ai l i ng or closely matched with Biden in key states.

“How t he hell can we be t i ed?” he s ai d at a r al l y i n Carson City, Nevada, where pol l s a c t ual l y s how Bi den ahead. “What's going on? ... We get these massive crowds. He gets nobody. And then they say we're tied. ... It doesn't make sense.”

Biden, meanwhile, was in Delaware f or s e ver a l days o f p r e p a r a t i o n a h e a d o f Thursday's final presidential debate. His r unning mate, California Sen. Kamala Harris, was r eturning t o t he campaign trail after several days in Washington after a close adviser tested positive for the coronavirus.

In addition to public polling that indicates Biden has a n e d g e , t h e f o r mer v i c e president enjoys another considerable advantage: money.

Trump raked in $12 million during a fundraiser Sunday a f t e r noon a t t he Newport B e a c h h o me o f t o p G O P donor and tech mogul Palmer Luckey, which also featured a performance by the Beach Boys.

B u t o v e r t h e p a s t f o u r months, Biden has raised over $1 billion, a massive amount of money that has eclipsed Trump's once-overwhelming cash advantage.

That's become apparent in advertising, where Biden and his Democratic allies are on pace to spend twice as much as Trump and the Republicans in the closing days of the race, according to data from the ad tracking firm Kantar/CMAG.

“We have more than sufficient air cover, almost three times as much as 2016,” said Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien, who insisted Trump has the advantage with the campaign's field staff and data targeting.

Though Trump has pulled b a c k f r o m a d v e r t i s i n g i n M i d w e s t e r n s t a t e s t h a t secured his 2016 win, he's invested heavily elsewhere, i ncl udi ng North Caroli na, where he is on pace to slightly outspend Biden.

Trump argued that his rallies could help make up the difference in states that remain close.

“Where we have states that are sort of tipping, could go either way,” he said. “I have an ability to go to those states and rally. Biden has no ability, I go to a rally we have 25,000 people. He goes to a rally and he has four people.”

“Every RALLY is BOFFO,” he tweeted later.

C o n c e r n a b o u t a p o s - sible l oss to Biden, spilling into the open in recent days. has been percolating behind t h e s c e n e s f r o m T r u mp . He has alternated between di s bel i e f a nd a nger a t t he i dea that he could l ose to a candidate whom he views as washed up, according to three campaign and White House off i ci al s not authorized t o speak publicly about private conversations.

Trump has directed anger at press coverage but also has vented about chief of staff Mark Meadows, whom he blames for mishandling his hospitalization and COVID relief talks. He has asked some of his closest advisers if a campaign shakeup was needed, according t o t he of f i c i al s . The president was encouraged to hold off on any moves this close to the election.