US Coronavirus Deaths Near 95,000; Trump Uses COVID-19 Call To Get Support For Elections

Like African-Americans, most Hispanic voters aren't fans of president Donald Trump. Trump suffers from a 77% unfavorability rating among Hispanics, according to polls by the Gallup organization covering January to March of this year. His standing among Hispanics is even worse today compared to 2016 when Trump won about 28% of the Hispanic vote.

Trump again attempted to address his negative image among Hispanics, this time with a conference call Wednesday intended to tackle the huge number of cases and deaths from COVID-19 affecting Hispanics disproportionately. He was also supposed to have broached solutions to the surge in Hispanic unemployment, which has hit 19% -- an all-time high -- and higher than any other demographic.

Instead, Trump used the call to focus on his re-election -- he boasted of his accomplishments and even talked about hydroxychloroquine. Some of those who took part in the call agreed Trump made no concrete commitments to address the problems they brought before him.

Trump also said a way for Hispanics to solve their problems will be to re-elect him in November. Trump "directly asked that the biggest thing that individuals can do is vote for (him) and get Hispanics to vote or we're going to get into a massive depression," said Sindy Benavides, CEO of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the largest and oldest Hispanic membership organization in the U.S. and established in 1929.

Benavides told CNN the White House conference call, which involved thousands of Hispanics, was "full of individuals who were a prepared list of Trump supporters, who did not question the President. It almost felt like it was a rally call as we head into November 3. He, in fact, mentioned November 3 a couple of times."

Ramiro Cavazos, president of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, asked Trump about how he can help Hispanic business owners attain government contracts. Trump replied with a suggestion he could issue an executive order on the matter, Cavazos told CNN.

Trump, however, showed some empathy for the plight of Hispanics, who are among the hardest hit demographics in the COVID-19 pandemic. Benavides said Trump ended the call by confirming cases in Florida and Georgia are "going down."

Hispanics are suffering much worse than other ethnicities from COVID-19. A report released April by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that in New York City, the country's COVID-19 epicenter, more Hispanics per capita are dying from the disease than any other ethnic group. It also said black Americans were hospitalized for COVID-19 at higher rates than whites.

The U.S. still leads the world in suffering from the COVID-19 pandemic. As of 8:00 p.m. ET, the U.S. had 1,591,575 confirmed cases of the disease and 94,939 deaths, according to Worldometer.