President Trump is notorious for the peculiar and bizarre lack of empathy he shows when visiting disaster sites, and today’s trip to tornado-ravaged Tennessee was no different. Vicious wind storms have killed 25 people and left widespread devastation in Putnam County, but the president’s mind wouldn’t let him stray from his number one priority — himself:
Surveying tornado damage, Trump touts "tremendous job numbers," then immediately says, "that's not something we want to be talking about." But he just did. pic.twitter.com/1PgLBiml9K
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) March 6, 2020
Speaking to the media, the president bragged about his “tremendous job numbers” before realizing that he shouldn’t be talking about it and adding that “that’s not something we want to be talking about.”
Even more bizarrely, the president emotionlessly spoke about how families had been entirely wiped out before growing excited during the recounting of the story of an eight-year-old boy who had been blown blocks down the street but was miraculously unharmed. “And how did his parents do?” he asked the officials after telling it.\
The official told him that “they were found deceased. He was the only surviving member of the household. Lost his sibling as well.”
Trump had no words of sympathy, not even a cursory “how horrible” or any kind of response at all to a horrifying human tragedy. Instead, he just moved on and said they were going to “go visit some folks now:”
Trump, surveying tornado damage in Tennessee, talks about a young child who was found walking in the street.
Trump: "How did his family do?"
Official: They're deceased.
Trump: "So his parents were killed. And his sister. So we're going to go see some of the folks." pic.twitter.com/zttQQiwPIO
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) March 6, 2020
President Trump previously has made headlines for being insensitive to the victims of natural disasters. Seemingly incapable of taking any somber moment seriously, he has been previously criticized for writing his name on the wall at a hurricane shelter, throwing paper towels into a crowd of hurricane refugees in Puerto Rico, and for telling a hurricane survivor whose house had been hit by a yacht tossed by the storm that at least he “got a free boat out of it.”
It is absolutely chilling to watch the President of the United States be told that a young child’s entire family has tragically died in a tornado and not respond to it in any way, and even more proof that he is not fit to lead this nation.
Who says this?
Here are some of Trump’s thoughts from his visit to Tennessee today. pic.twitter.com/MKjcQXJ7Cu
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) March 6, 2020