Republican Governor Says Trump's Coronavirus Test Remarks 'Not True'

President Donald Trump said Monday that the United States has “done more tests, by far, than any country in the world.... Our testing is also better than any country in the world.” The Republican governor of Maryland, Larry Hogan, however, said the president’s remarks are untrue.

Appearing on NPR’s Morning Edition Tuesday, Hogan characterized Trump’s claims as misleading.

“Yeah, that's just not true. I mean I know that they've taken some steps to create new tests, but they're not actually produced and distributed out to the states. No state has enough testing,” Hogan said.

Hogan later appeared on CNN, where he painted a grim picture Maryland and other states are facing in their efforts to grapple with the Covid-19 pandemic. He once again stressed how his states’ ability to respond to the disease has been hampered by a severe lack of tests.

“Without the tests we really are flying blind, we're sort of guessing about where the outbreaks are and about what the infection rate and the hospitalization rates are,” Hogan said.

Hogan is the first Republican governor to openly contradict the president about the nature of the coronavirus pandemic. But he isn’t been the only governor to clash with Trump.

Four Democratic governors have been vocal about what they claim to be a lack of leadership from Trump during this crisis, including New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and California Gov. Gavin Newsom. Cuomo has slammed Trump over what he said was essentially encouragement from the White House for states to compete among each other for limited medical supplies.

More criticism came from Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who drew Trump’s ire last week after blasting the White House for its failure to organize what “should have been a coordinated effort by the federal government.”

Trump has not taken these criticisms well, attacking both on Twitter and during his annual press conferences expressing doubt over states’ medical equipment requests.

Last week, Trump appeared to suggest that governors needed to maintain a favorable relationship with him in order to facilitate federal coronavirus assistance.

“We are doing very well with, I think, almost all of the governors, for the most part. But you know, it’s a two-way street. They have to treat us well,” Trump said.

With Gov. Hogan, a Republican, chiming in on the criticism of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, he could very well be the next to face the president’s wrath – especially as Trump may view Hogan’s words as a betrayal to him and the Republican Party.