Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian(WASHINGTON) — One day after President Donald Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro publicly pushed back against the nation’s top infectious disease expert on whether to promote use of an unproven drug to treat COVID-19, memorandums that the economist wrote to the White House earlier in the year may come back to haunt the administration.
Navarro issued a dire warning in a White House memo in late January of the potential for the novel coronavirus to cost the U.S. economy trillions of dollars and to claim half a million American lives, multiple sources familiar with the matter confirm to ABC News.
Navarro’s warnings grew still more urgent in a second memo in February, in which he estimated that as many as one to two million Americans could die and called for immediate asking Congress for more money to deal with the problem.
The documents reveal that at least some Trump administration officials had considered and perhaps even circulated the possibility of a serious outbreak, while the president was publicly downplaying its impact.
Meanwhile, Drs. Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx and other members of the White House coronavirus task force revealed Monday that social distancing and mitigation measures appear to be working to flatten the curve in some areas.
Here are the latest developments in the government response:
Navarro issued dire internal warning of virus in January
President Trump’s trade adviser Peter Navarro issued a dire warning in a White House memorandum in late January of the potential for the novel coronavirus to claim a half-million American lives and cost the U.S. economy trillions of dollars, multiple sources familiar with the matter confirm to ABC News.
Navarro’s warnings grew still more urgent in a second memo in February, in which he estimated that as many as one to two million Americans could die and called for taking immediate supplemental appropriations measures.
The existence of the memos, which represent the first high-level warning of the virus circulated within the White House, was first reported by the New York Times.
In his January memo, Navarro made a case for an immediate travel ban on China. Days later, President Trump announced tight restrictions on travel from China.
Even as the president took action to restrict travel from China, President Trump continued to publicly downplay the virus for weeks and has since defended the administration’s slow response time.
While the White House has declined to comment on the memorandums, another one of President Trump’s top economic advisers, Larry Kudlow, said he had not seen the memos and noted that there are “a lot of voices in the administration.”
Surgeon General Jerome Adams also said he had not seen the memorandums but acknowledged that the virus has “humbled many of us” in government.
“I’ve been in public health for 20 years. We’ve been saying for decades this is a possible. When you look at SARS, MERS, the situations we’ve dealt with, many people at all levels just did not expect something like this to happen at this magnitude. There are many lessons learned. This virus humbled many of us. At the federal, state, local level we’ll backtrack and try to figure out how to improve going forward,” Adams said Tuesday in an interview with NBC News.
Surgeon general says mitigation is working
Surgeon General Jerome Adams, on ABC’s Good Morning America Tuesday morning, said there’s cause for “both” optimism and concern in the days ahead as the nation fights the coronavirus.
While he said it’s going to be “a hard and tough week,” Adams also said he’s encouraged by evidence that some U.S. hot spot locations like Washington and California having seen cases come down, demonstrating that “the American people have the power to change the trajectory of this epidemic if we come together.”
“I feel a lot more optimistic again because I’m seeing mitigation work,” Adams said Tuesday morning, after earlier warning that this week would be a “Pearl Harbor” or “9/11 moment.”
For voters in Wisconsin set to head to the polls, Adams advised that where in-person voting is the only option, people should “please try to maintain six feet of distance between you and the next nearest person” and to “consider wearing a cloth facial covering.”
On the lack of a national stay-at-home order, Adams was careful not to break with the president and emphasized that local governments have the real enforcement capabilities and applauded the American people for voluntarily abiding by social distancing practices.
Grisham out as White House press secretary
After less than a year on the job, White House press secretary and communications director Stephanie Grisham is stepping down, according to senior Trump administration officials.
Grisham is returning to the East Wing to start immediately as first lady Melania Trump’s chief of staff and spokesperson, her office announced Tuesday.
Sources say the president is considering adding to the White House communications team by bringing on Alyssa Farah, the current spokesperson for the Department of Defense and longtime aide to new Chief of Staff Mark Meadows. Trump is also considering having Kayleigh McEnany transition from the re-election campaign to the White House, though no final decisions have been made.
Grisham spent two weeks in self-quarantine in March after coming into contact with a Brazilian official who tested positive for COVID-19, though she later negative for the virus.
She leaves the role without ever having given a press briefing at the podium.
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