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The Two States Where Trump's COVID-19 Response Could Backfire in 2020
The fact that Trump is willing to let Americans die to satisfy his vindictiveness underscores why Democrats need to not only win the White House, but do their best to unseat every Congressional Republican who has enabled him.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/04/trump-whitmer-desantis-coronavirus/609727/
handful of swing states will almost certainly decide the winner of November’s presidential election. And in two of them, Michigan and Florida, Donald Trump’s complicated relationship with their governors could expose him to greater political risk as the economic and social price of the coronavirus pandemic mounts.
Trump faces mirror-image threats. Michigan voters could interpret Trump’s animosity toward Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer as punishing the state. By contrast, in Florida, Trump’s liability could be his close relationship with Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, which is seen by many as one reason DeSantis was slow to impose a statewide stay-at-home order.
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Michigan is where Trump’s behavior presents the clearer danger to him come November. The president has repeatedly disparaged Whitmer and suggested that the White House should not return her calls, even as the state is buckling under the nation’s third-largest coronavirus caseload and faces medical-equipment and staffing shortages. “It is politically stupid of the president to pick a fight with a governor who is trying to manage a crisis in a state that he has to win,” Eric Goldman, Whitmer’s former campaign manager, says flatly.
In Florida, conditions have not yet reached such a crisis point, though its caseload is growing steadily. But because DeSantis waited so long to act, he and Trump could be punished if the outbreak ultimately imposes a heavy cost on the state. “If this does get worse and worse … I think DeSantis’s vulnerability is Trump’s vulnerability,” says Adam Smith, a Tampa-based senior vice president at the bipartisan firm Mercury Public Affairs.
Trump faces mirror-image threats. Michigan voters could interpret Trump’s animosity toward Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer as punishing the state. By contrast, in Florida, Trump’s liability could be his close relationship with Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, which is seen by many as one reason DeSantis was slow to impose a statewide stay-at-home order.
* * *
Michigan is where Trump’s behavior presents the clearer danger to him come November. The president has repeatedly disparaged Whitmer and suggested that the White House should not return her calls, even as the state is buckling under the nation’s third-largest coronavirus caseload and faces medical-equipment and staffing shortages. “It is politically stupid of the president to pick a fight with a governor who is trying to manage a crisis in a state that he has to win,” Eric Goldman, Whitmer’s former campaign manager, says flatly.
In Florida, conditions have not yet reached such a crisis point, though its caseload is growing steadily. But because DeSantis waited so long to act, he and Trump could be punished if the outbreak ultimately imposes a heavy cost on the state. “If this does get worse and worse … I think DeSantis’s vulnerability is Trump’s vulnerability,” says Adam Smith, a Tampa-based senior vice president at the bipartisan firm Mercury Public Affairs.
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