Donald Trump, COVID-19, And The Francis Scott Key Bridge Calamity

If he becomes president again, he'll extort Maryland and Baltimore rather than be president for all Americans—just like last time.

(Photo by WilliamSherman)

Four years ago this week, it became clear that Donald Trump would husband emergency pandemic resources like ventilators and personal protective equipment for Republican-run states. Or rather, Trump made it clear. Blue-state leaders would get to see their residents die gasping for air unless they feigned fulsome praise for his pandemic response in public. “If they don’t treat you right, I don’t call,” he declared.

Three days ago this morning, an enormous cargo ship lost power and drifted into a pillar holding up the Francis Scott Key bridge, which collapsed instantly into the Patapsco River in Baltimore, MD. 

If early reports are accurate, the catastrophe in Maryland has shined a light on the very best of public service: With just two minutes to act between the distress call and the collision, police were able to block access quickly, such that the final vehicle to pass the point of no return had crossed safely before the bridge disintegrated. Officials even attempted to save a crew of eight construction workers filling potholes, but could not alert them in time. Six of them died. On Tuesday, President Biden promised the federal government would prioritize rebuilding the bridge and reopening the port as quickly and frictionlessly as possible. 

“It’s my intention that federal government will pay for the entire cost of reconstructing that bridge,” Biden said, “and I expect the Congress to support my effort.”

Already the contrast with Trump’s response to COVID-19, devoid as it was of common humanity, is stark. But its not just the contrast that looms large in my mind. It’s also the recognition that the Baltimore rescue might still be underway seven months from now when voters cast their ballots for president. And we know from Trump’s response to COVID, and to a number of other disasters that struck non-Republican states and territories during his single term, that if he inherits the effort to rebuild after this disaster, he will likely sabotage it or hold it hostage until the leaders of Baltimore and Maryland offer him political favors or concessions. It’s a reminder in microcosm of one of Trump’s most disqualifying abuses of power, and why it’s critical for real reporters to press him for a response to the Key bridge calamity—whether he intends to resume using federal disaster resources as a tool to extort his political enemies. 

KEY TO THE KINGDOM

As of this writing, Trump has said nothing at all about the Key bridge collapse. And why would he? It can not after all be blamed on the Democratic mayor of Baltimore, or the Democratic governor of Maryland, or the Democratic president of the United States. The men killed in the accident were immigrants, rather than blue-collar white men. So as far as Trump is concerned, it merits no comment. No condolences to the families of the dead; no assurances to the affected communities that he intends to be their president, too. 

Left to his own devices, Trump will either continue to ignore the incident, or he’ll respond only when prompted by an ally in right-wing media. Extrapolating from his response to every other tragedy, he might assert monomaniacally that the accident simply wouldn’t have happened if he’d been president. He’ll almost certainly assert that if he were president, the bridge would be rebuilt in a matter of weeks instead of months, notwithstanding his famously abysmal failure to build anything of significance during his presidency. 

But unless cornered, he won’t say whether the government should foot the bill for the recovery or whether he’d attach conditions to it like he did with ventilators and PPE. 

Reporters should be intent on pressing him for a response anyhow, but President Biden and Democrats should do their part, too. For starters, they should begin to make good on Biden’s rebuilding commitment by introducing supplemental legislation to fund the project as soon as possible, and see whether Trump—either directly or through his sock puppet Mike Johnson—supports it, or tries to take it hostage. 

COCKS, DEI

Since the earliest days of the Biden presidency I’ve encouraged him—all Democrats, really, but in this matter him specifically—to treat natural and man-made emergencies as occasions to remind Americans that the Trump-era days of playing partisan favorites with disaster victims were over. That his predecessor would let Americans of all persuasions suffer if he held a grudge against their elected representatives, and that Republicans in Congress happily played along. 

It’s admittedly a close call, but of Trump’s myriad corrupt acts and abuses of power prior to the January 6 insurrection, I found this tendency most infuriating. Unlike most of his antics, this one carried murderously evil intent. Trump could steal federal dollars to play golf, or accept payments from foreign governments, or shake down allies, and while all those things were corrosive and reflective of his contempt for the public interest, they didn’t amount to hateful vengeance against his own citizens. 

His response to disasters was morally disqualifying conduct, and worth denouncing repeatedly, if only as a matter of civic education. Americans should know that it’s not acceptable conduct for leaders of democracies, and incompatible with the ideal of a free and equal citizenry. But I’ve always believed it would be a politically potent attack, too. 

There are about as many Republican voters in Maryland as there are adults of any political persuasion in the state of New Hampshire. The states Trump most completely abandoned to COVID-19 are home to tens of millions of Americans, and while most of them are Democrats, a huge minority are Republicans. Trump imagines most MAGA voters will thrill to the idea of abandoning the Americans they most hate in moments of distress, even if they happen to be collateral damage. And there surely are some Republicans so in thrall to Trump that they cheered along as he blamed California for its wildfires even as their homes were surrounded by kindling. But not all! The most reliable force driving people out of the Leopards Eating People’s Faces Party is the realization that the leopards will come for their faces, too, eventually.

That’s the most direct angle. Make it clear to Republican-leaning voters in Wisconsin and Michigan and elsewhere that Trump will hurt them because of where they live. But here’s another: Ask why. Why, beyond petty vendettas and a lust for dominance does Trump single out places like Baltimore. Or Puerto Rico. Why does he think there’s a political edge for him in kicking them when they’re down?

I know why! Republicans see it as an opportunity, like so many others, to pander to bigots under the cover of some other excuse. Trump would notionally pretend that the places he shook down were “horribly run” and thus undeserving of government largesse. But the racists knew: it was because they’re filled with non-white people. 

There are obvious moral problems with GOP race politics. But the biggest practical one is that, under Trump, the swapping out of dog whistles for train whistles means Republicans can no longer pander to reactionaries without kicking open the door to the most vile of bigots.

Trump’s supporters have filled his void of silence just as you’d expect. They’ve blamed “DEI” for the accident, because the political leadership of the city and state is black. They’ve fanned antisemitic conspiracy theories and conspiracy theories about terrorism and immigrants because a) that’s what bigots do, and b) if they have no legitimate basis to blame bad news on their perceived enemies, they can always be counted on to fabricate one. 

If you squint at the polls just so, you can find Republicans on the majoritarian side of narrow “DEI” controversies, just as you can find them on the majoritarian side of the narrow issue of trans high-school sports athletes. But Republicans plainly have no first-principles commitments on either matter. They dredged them up for the purposes of anti-black and anti-trans pandering. And so there’s no principle limiting the political appeals to the narrower issues. They aren’t really fixed solely on the merits of white-guilt seminars or the tiny number of trans girls outcompeting cis girls. And so, by picking these fights, they made it open season on whole races and genders.

Americans might have nuanced misgivings about this or that—who has to bake wedding cakes for whom, for instance—but given a choice between siding with a tolerant faction or a bigoted one, most will flock to the former. 

Even some of the right-wing operatives responsible for igniting the initial culture wars seem to grasp this

For three years, Biden has chosen not to force a reckoning with this facet of the Trump presidency—the one that screamed, you don’t get a ventilator if your governor is a Democrat, and who cares anyhow, since most of you aren’t even white. I’m surprised that even now, when the “four years ago” comparisons are insanely favorable to Biden, how thin and uncoordinated the Democratic effort is to remind the public just how badly COVID-19 exposed the bankruptcy of MAGA politics. It should not be left to a rapid-response Twitter account and a passing speech. We can not go back, and if you can’t bring yourself to reflect on the pandemic to understand why, a nightmarish reminder now protrudes from the Patapsco River. The government needs to rebuild the Key bridge without punishing the people who depend on it. And voters deserve to know: Will Trump do what’s right? Or is Baltimore too black to be worthy of federal help?