Trumps Attacks Critics, Media As #TrumpLiedPeopleDied Trends Following Admission He Downplayed COVID Danger

Donald Trump Thursday defended his decision to conceal the danger of the COVID-19 pandemic as the hashtag "TrumpLiedPeopleDied" trended.

Trump has acknowledged he knew how dangerous the virus was but downplayed it publicly, taped interviews with journalist Bob Woodward for his upcoming book “Rage" showed. Now, Trump faced a barrage of criticism by those saying that thousands of lives might have been saved by earlier action.

The outrage compared Trump's approach to COVID-19 to Obama's handling of the 2014 Ebola epidemic, noting discrepancies in Trump's messaging around both COVID-19 and the recordings themselves.

The latest information from Johns Hopkins put the U.S. COVID death count at 191,360 Thursday afternoon. Democratic politicians immediately reacted to Woodward's revelations as well, accusing Trump of willfully trading American lives for better publicity.

Joe Biden Wednesday blamed Trump's deception for thousands of deaths.

"I absolutely do [blame him]," Biden said. "Remember what was said by the Columbia medical school. If he had acted one week earlier in March, there would be over 37,000 people alive, according to the experts.”

“The idea that he knew how it was spread,” he added. “The idea that he knew what was going on. He denied that he was briefed. Remember he said he wasn’t briefed by the intelligence community, how bad it was? He didn’t read it? He just flat lied. That’s wrong. Totally irresponsible. Totally irresponsible.”

Sen. Chuck Schumer said Woodward's book was “damning proof that Donald Trump lied and people died.”

rump fought back, calling the revelations "a political hit job by rapidly fading Bob Woodward and his boring book. It never ends!" He then sent out a string of messages and retweets attacking Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Obama, anti-police-violence protesters, a Democratic "coup," former FBI Director James Comey and school lockdowns.

Trump also attacked Woodward, casting doubt on the severity of the quotes.

"Bob Woodward had my quotes for many months. If he thought they were so bad or dangerous, why didn’t he immediately report them in an effort to save lives? Didn’t he have an obligation to do so? No, because he knew they were good and proper answers. Calm, no panic!" he tweeted.

Woodward isn’t discussing the content of his book before its release but defended his decision not to publicize the recordings immediately in an interview with the Washington Post. He said Trump did not tell him his sources, and “the biggest problem I had, which is always a problem with Trump, is I didn’t know if it was true.”

Even after the months it took to verify and contextualize the information, Woodward wasn’t sure if just releasing the recordings would have much impact, given the cavalcade of Trump administration scandals. He says that he wanted to deliver the information in the “best obtainable version of the truth,” on the condition that there would be time for readers to obtain the information before Nov. 3. “The demarcation is the election,” Woodward said.

Trump also attacked the rest of the news media, saying, “Fake news is at it again! They will take any statement from me, no matter how proper or well delivered, and systematically, in complete conjunction with all of their allies, dismantle it. With Biden, they only give him softballs, and let him read the answers from a teleprompter!”