Donald Trump has always wanted very much never to go to jail. However, if he is not re-elected, there is a very good chance that he will go to jail, just like Michael Cohen did. Trump has long believed that the key to his winning re-election has been a rising stock market because with a rising stock market he can sell the idea that he is good for the economy. When COVID-19 first appeared, people like Jared Kushner advised Trump that if he raised too much alarm about COVID, then the stock market might plunge—thus endangering his chances for re-election. Near the end of February, the relationship between COVID-19 fears and the U.S. Stock Market solidified in Donald Trump’s mind.
Perhaps some readers remember this article from February 25, 2020:
President Donald Trump is reportedly furious that stocks are plunging, believing that health officials’ warnings have spooked investors, The Washington Post reported Tuesday night, citing two people familiar with the president’s thinking.
The president has reportedly cautioned aides against forecasting the impact of the virus over fears that stocks could fall further, The Washington Post said.
The words “believing that health officials’ warnings have spooked investors” shows us what has been the core of Donald Trump’s thinking from February on when it comes to COVID-19. Notice that Trump wasn’t upset with worry at all of the people that might die. No, that is what a normal person would have been worried about. And we can be sure that Trump knew at the time the stock market crashed in late February just how dangerous COVID-19 was because of the Bob Woodward tapes just released.
Instead of being filled with worry about what might happen to the American public if COVID-19 ran rampant across America, Trump was upset that the stock market had plunged when people started to take COVID-19 seriously. Donald Trump has never worried about all of the people who might die from COVID-19. Trump has only worried that COVID-19 fears might make the American public panic in such a way that it might hurt the stock market, which in turn he believed would hurt his reelection chances.
Trump has had no problem trying to scare people with the lie that brown-skinned rapists are crossing America’s Southern border in droves. He has no problem telling America that if Biden is elected, poor, dangerous people of color will flood the suburbs. Trump is only worried about scaring people if he thinks that this scare will hurt his re-election chances. This is why he has been downplaying the COVID-19 threat from the very beginning, and this is why he has done so little to combat the coronavirus threat. Donald Trump thought that the more he did to fight COVID-19, the bigger problem the coronavirus threat would seem to be, and thus, the bigger would be the negative reaction from the stock market. The problem with this ridiculous thinking is that, by not working hard to combat the virus, the stock market plunged anyway.
Right now, the stock market is being held aloft primarily by the Federal Reserve pumping so much money into the economy that the U.S. economy does not collapse—and by enough people going back to work and going to school that things seem somewhat normal.
In Trump’s mind, keeping the stock market up requires both The Fed pumping tens of billions of dollars each month into the economy as quietly as possible--through what most normal people would call Quantitative Easing--and by the U.S. appearing as close to normal as possible--by people going to school and working. Trump simply has never cared how many people have had to die along the way. All he has worried about has been that there was enough appearance of normality that the stock market has stayed aloft.
This is why Donald Trump has made fun of people who wear masks. It is why the White House deliberately pushed the chairs together at a White House press briefing until reporters screamed about it. It is why Trump held a fourth of July celebration at Mount Rushmore with people packed together and hardly anyone wearing a mask. In short, it is why Trump has “played down” the COVID-19 threat. For Trump, ever since that stock market plunge near the end of February, it has always been about keeping the stock market up, and keeping it up has always been about creating the appearance of normality—regardless of the facts—and regardless of how many people die. If 200,000 people have to die so that Trump can get re-elected, so be it.
Currently, the U.S. Stock market is running on borrowed time, as well as borrowed money from the Federal Government via The Fed. Trump figures he only has to keep the illusion of a healthy stock market going until the election. If Biden wins, Trump could let the stock market collapse and then blame it all on “the market’s reaction to Biden winning”. The truth would be that Trump had simply stopped the Quantitative Easing that the fed has been doing to keep the stock market up, and then the stock market plunged.