As COVID-19 claimed another 1,000 American lives today, Donald Trump, the Golfer In Chief, hit the links with football great Brett Favre today at his golf club in the suburban New Jersey hamlet of Bedminster.
White House deputy press secretary Judd Deere shared a photo of the US president alongside Favre, the three-time NFL MVP who played the bulk of his career with the Green Bay Packers and was inducted to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2016.
The visit to marked Trump’s 10th trip to one of his golf courses in the last 29 days.
Favre, who played 17 seasons with the Packers before finishing with the New York Jets and Minnesota Vikings, retired in 2010.
The Hall of Fame quarterback drew heavy criticism earlier this year for saying that former NFL Quarterback Colin Kaepernick would, in time, be considered a “hero” for speaking out against police brutality and racial injustice just as NFL player Pat Tillman is considered a hero for qutting football to enlist in the U.S. Army after 9/11.
After ridicule from the far-right, Favre attempted to walk back the comparison.
Rory McIlroy, the PGA Tour’s current world No 2 who faced intense backlash after playing a round of golf with Trump shortly following his inauguration in 2017, said he wouldn’t play with him again if asked.
McIlroy criticized Trump’s politicization of a pandemic that has now claimed more than 140,000 American lives.
“We’re in the midst of something that’s pretty serious right now and the fact that he’s trying to politicize it and make it a campaign rally and say we’re administering the most tests in world like it is a contest – there’s something that just is terrible,” McIlroy said.
He added: “It’s not the way a leader should act. There’s a sort of diplomacy that you need to have, and I don’t think he’s showing that, especially in these times.”
The United States on Friday came just short of breaking its single-day record for new coronavirus cases, adding more than 73,400, the second-highest daily total, and signaling that infection rates show no signs of slowing.
The single-day record, set on July 16, is 75,697 cases.
Since June 24, the seven-day average has more than doubled, from 31,402 to more than 66,100 on Friday.
Friday was also the fourth consecutive day with more than 1,100 deaths reported.
As the number of cases has continued to climb, so has the number of hospitalizations, which had skirted its own record in recent days.
On Friday, the number of people known to be hospitalized with the coronavirus in the United States was 59,670, according to the Covid Tracking Project, a few hundred short of the record of 59,940 reported by the database on April 15.
Trump’s work ethic hypocrisy is also on display here.
Months before he would announce his candidacy for president, Trump was in full birther mode as he made several rounds on various cable news programs and talk shows attempting to delegitimize America’s first black president, Barack Obama.
But when he took a pause from his factless racist attacks, he’d instead take issue with Obama’s penchant for hitting the links.
In October of 2014, Trump tweeted that Obama was being derelict in his duties as a sitting president because he was golfing, writing, “Can you believe that, with all of the problems and difficulties facing the U.S., President Obama spent the day playing golf. Worse than Carter.”
Can you believe that,with all of the problems and difficulties facing the U.S., President Obama spent the day playing golf.Worse than Carter
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 14, 2014
And then again that same month Trump bashed Obama. But this time it wasn’t only about the former president golfing but golfing during a health crisis. You can’t make this stuff up.
“President Obama has a major meeting on the NYC Ebola outbreak, with people flying in from all over the country, but decided to play golf!” Trump tweeted.
President Obama has a major meeting on the N.Y.C. Ebola outbreak, with people flying in from all over the country, but decided to play golf!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 24, 2014
Trump, as a phone-in guest on Fox News in 2014, spoke about Obama playing golf when at the time there were two Ebola cases in the U.S.
“When you’re president, you sorta say, ‘I’m gonna give golf up for a couple of years and really focus on the job,’” Trump said. “It sends the wrong signal.”
Trump is golfing today.
In 2014 on Fox and Friends he criticized Obama for golfing when there were *two cases* of Ebola in the United States saying, “it sends the wrong signal” and he should have given up golf as president “to really focus on the job.” https://t.co/br8jLwVLts pic.twitter.com/Jmh5CSt2mp
— andrew kaczynski🤔 (@KFILE) May 23, 2020
And in 2016, then-candidate Trump said, “I’m going to be working for you. I’m not going to have time to go play golf.”
Donald Trump has spent more time on the golf course in his first term than any other president in history.
As of today, Trump has spent more time on the golf course in three and a half years as Obama did in eight.