Inside the Oval Office, a Fierce Fight Over Trump’s Virus Speech
- Medical experts made case to ban Europeans from entering U.S.
- His economic advisers pushed back, fearing lost jobs
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Donald Trump sat in the Oval Office Wednesday before the biggest speech of his presidency, listening to his aides argue about whether barring Europeans from traveling to the U.S. would trigger a global depression.
The medical experts on his team were adamant: The best way to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus was to buy time by keeping Europeans out, they said, with the hope the virus may naturally ebb in the warmer weather, according to people familiar with the deliberations. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Larry Kudlow, the president’s top economic adviser, pushed back strongly, saying the economic cost would be steep.