Trump Threatens to Punish China Over Coronavirus
Trump claims evidence virus came from US-funded Wuhan lab
Posted on Categories
On Thursday, President Trump threatened to impose new measures against China to punish them over the coronavirus, while pushing the idea that he had seen secret evidence that the virus was linked to a Wuhan lab.
Trump pushed the idea of this evidence, and when pressed by reporters added that he’s “not allowed to tell you” why he believes what he’s seen.
If he knows anything about the Wuhan lab in question, however, it is probably owing to the US having funded the lab, and trained a number of workers. The lab had done experiments on bats from Wuhan, a source from which the Covid-19 virus may have emerged.
The US has been funding that lab for the past decade, which raises questions about why anything the lab may have done would be the Chinese government’s fault, as opposed to the fruits of US government funding. There may be political reasons, however.
President Trump has been very keen to brand his upcoming opponent Joe Biden as a Chinese sympathizer in recent advertising, and claims China would want Biden to win, though China insists it has no interest in meddling in the US vote either way.
If Trump intends to keep up this campaign strategy, however, he may feel that blaming China for coronavirus, even in part, would vilify them enough to hurt Biden. Since the Democrats will no doubt use claims of Trump’s similar ties to Russia, it may be a race to see which nation the candidates can make the American voters fear more.
Theories abound on coronavirus, no doubt fueled by it being a once-in-a-generation threat. While Trump doesn’t seem to intend to direct espouse any particular theory at this point, he seems very interested in keeping the conversation heading in that direction with his own claims of things he’d seen and can’t talk about.
