Trump voiced his displeasure today with Dr. Fauci’s comments in yesterday’s hearing where Fauci was very cautious about opening the economy and schools (video is cued up to 12:35):
When asked about Fauci’s comments, Trump initially said Dr. Fauci “wants to play all sides of the equation” but didn’t elaborate further.
Trump was then asked why to clarify his comment and said:
I was surprised by his answer, actually. To me it’s not an acceptable answer especially when it comes to schools. The only thing that would be acceptable, as I said, is professors, teachers, etc. over a certain age, I think they ought to take it easy for another few weeks, five weeks, four weeks, who knows, whatever it may be. But I think they have to be careful because this is a disease that attacks age and it attacks health. If you have a heart problem, if you have diabetes, if you’re a certain age, it’s certainly much more dangerous. But with young children and students, just take a look at the statistics, it’s pretty amazing.
Trump seemed to really be focused on schools more than anything. In another answer, perhaps the one right before this, Trump said that if the schools are opening then he doesn’t consider the country reopening.
As you heard yesterday in Fauci’s answer to Rand Paul, he was very cautious about reopening schools because, as he suggested, there are too many things we still don’t know about the virus. I suspect that’s the answer Trump was referring above that he didn’t like. Clearly Trump doesn’t believe the disease is a big problem for children and wants to get the schools reopening once it’s safe for faculty members.