Trump claims China doesn't want him to be re-elected

Donald Trump.
(Image credit: Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images)

President Trump on Wednesday said Chinese officials will "do anything they can" to ensure he is not re-elected in November, telling Reuters that the way Beijing has handled the coronavirus pandemic is proof of this.

In the United States, there are more than one million confirmed COVID-19 cases, and at least 60,000 people have died from the virus. Trump pushed back at critics who say he didn't act fast enough in the early days of the pandemic, when he declared coronavirus was "going to disappear" like "a miracle." China should have been more forthcoming with information on the virus, Trump told Reuters, and the country's officials are "constantly using public relations to try to make it like they're innocent parties."

Trump believes China "will do anything they can to have me lose" the presidential election because he has been tough on trade. When asked if he would consider imposing more tariffs against China, Trump responded, "There are many things I can do. We're looking for what happened."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Continue reading for free

We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.

Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.

Catherine Garcia

Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.