Trump trade adviser: Rally comment on reducing Covid testing was just a joke – POLITICO

White Condominium commerce adviser Peter Navarro stated Sunday that President Donald Trump was handiest joking when he stated he asked his administration to unhurried down coronavirus checking out for the sake of optics.

Speaking with CNN’s Jake Tapper on “Command of the Union,“ Navarro many events stated, “Near on now, Jake. You mark it was tongue in cheek. Near on now. That was tongue in cheek,” elimination Tapper as he many events asked in regards to the president’s remarks.

“I produce now no longer know that it was tongue in cheek at all,” Tapper retorted.

“That’s info for you, tongue in cheek,” Navarro stated with a dismissive laugh.

Trump stated at some level of a comeback rally Saturday evening that he had urged officials to diminish the selection of coronavirus tests to mood the rising an infection price in the country. The U.S. has surged to the country with essentially the most infections on this planet.

“In the occasion you attain checking out to that extent, you is at threat of be going to build up more folks,” Trump stated at some level of his rally in Tulsa, Okla. “You is at threat of be going to build up more conditions. So I stated to my folks, unhurried the checking out down please.”

Trump has made similar remarks previously, but by no method as explicitly and to as trim a platform as on Saturday evening. The White Condominium has since stated a few events that the president was joking.

“Near on. It was a lightweight moment,” Navarro stated.

There possess been greater than 2 million conditions of coronavirus identified in the US, causing greater than 110,000 deaths.