The president selectively highlighted statistics, falsely claimed New York and New Jersey were solely responsible for high national death rates and again wrongly asserted that a rise in cases was because of testing.
President Trump, in a news conference on Tuesday, cited a slew of statistics to argue that “our strong mitigation efforts are working very well.” Here’s a fact-check. what Mr. Trump said “Thanks to substantial improvements in treatment and the knowledge we have gained about the disease itself, the recent rise in cases has not been accompanied by a significant increase in deaths. Fatalities nationwide are at roughly half the level of the April peak.” This is misleading. Mr. Trump is right that the number of deaths, currently averaging over 1,000 a day, remain well below the 2,200 deaths a day seen in April, according to a New York Times database. But fatalities nationwide have increased and are double that of the low in July, when daily deaths hovered below 500. what Mr. Trump said “The numbers are going down, but Florida is going down very significantly. Texas and California are going down rather significantly.” This is misleading. As of Tuesday evening, the number of new cases in California, Florida and Texas were declining, but the number of deaths had plateaued or even increased. Over all, cases are increasing in 16 states and have remained level in 28 states, while deaths are increasing in 27 states. what Mr. Trump said “A lot of our numbers were based on the New York — had a very tough time, as you know — New York, New Jersey, that area.
