POLITICO NIGHTLY: Who's to blame?

By Ryan Heath

Presented by

FAULT LINES — The Olympics Games are postponed, but the Coronavirus Blame Games are taking their place. There's plenty to go around. Blame Trump. Blame China. Blame the wet markets. Blame the Spring Breakers. Blame the cruise industry. Blame export bans. Blame online influencers . Blame governors who ignored numbers and the wisdom of their neighbors. Blame Bill de Blasio telling you to keep living your life. Blame Fox News for telling viewers one thing and staff another. They all deserve it. It's probably fair to blame everyone who contributed to this system failure. There's no one scapegoat. The virus defies neat blame just as easily as it defies borders. But there are others who don't deserve the fingers pointed their way. Coronavirus is a cover for existing prejudice: You don't have to look hard to find racist forms of blame. And never blame the infected. Well, almost never. This week, blame seemed like it was tipping over into shame. "You got Covid-19 and it's your fault," is a message already being cast at those who continue to worship in public or go on vacation. Who hasn't wondered about the blameworthiness of those still boarding cruises in late March? They're the last on most people's sympathy list. But is it fair to scorn parents who use public playgrounds with their kids to stay sane? What about the health care workers on subway trains, or the people staffing your supermarket register? They are doing the right thing by going to work and still might infect themselves — or you. Like most things in America these days, the blame game is probably headed for court. "I got Covid-19 and it's your fault" arguments are just lawsuits that haven't happened yet. Who was thoughtless and who was negligent? The answer will determine if death by Covid-19 becomes a tragic, iconic white collar crime. When it comes to political blame at least, the truth wins out in the end. There will be commissions and campaigns to add to the court cases. In the United Kingdom, a top medical official was forced to apologize for misleading the public on testing. In the United States, November's election will be a moment of national political reckoning, and potentially its own huge logistical mess. So who are you going to be? The person who airbrushed their January and February actions, or the one who switched focus to what they can fix tomorrow? Welcome to POLITICO Nightly: Coronavirus Special Edition, a nightly intelligence brief from our global newsroom on the impact of the coronavirus on politics and policy, the economy and global health. Coronavirus finally came for Corona beer. Reach out to your guest host: rheath@politico.com and @politicoryan. Or tell Renu you missed her: rrayasam@politico.com and @renurayasam.

A message from Navigator Research: More than half of Americans know someone who has lost their job because of the coronavirus pandemic, up 15 points in just a week, according to "Navigating Coronavirus, a new daily tracking poll by Navigator Research measuring the impact of the pandemic on American life. See the latest report.

People wearing face masks are reflected in a mirrored wall as they descend an escalator in Tokyo. Trump announced new CDC guidelines today, recommending voluntary cloth or fabric masks for public use, while still asking citizens to avoid medical- or surgical-grade masks. The president said he would likely not wear a mask. | Getty Images

First In Nightly

SOUTHERN EXPOSURE — St. John the Baptist Parish, just south of Baton Rouge, La., has a population of just over 43,000 — and the highest per capita coronavirus mortality rate in the nation. Frantic local officials there instituted an overnight curfew just this week and are begging residents to stay home. Hot spots like St. John the Baptist are erupting throughout the south, Dan Goldberg and Alice Miranda Ollstein write. The virus is poised to consume the area around Norfolk, Va.; a rural county in Tennessee just north of Nashville; and parts of southwest Georgia near Albany, according to models assembled by Columbia University epidemiologists that are updated every few days.

Palace Intrigue

WHO KNEW WHAT WHEN? — That debate has been rumbling for weeks now, but revelations that the CIA flagged China's numbers as untrustworthy in early February have increased pressure on the White House to explain what the United States knew, too. Our White House correspondent and associate editor Anita Kumar says: "There have been many times in Trump's presidency that he didn't trust his own intelligence agencies. This could be another one." Our Congress reporter Kyle Cheney adds: "This is just the latest example of a screaming siren that went unheeded, and even contradicted, by the president, who has vacillated between praising his Chinese counterpart and slamming the country for enabling the spread of the disease that has paralyzed the world. For all the hindsight claims that impeachment distracted Trump from a more concerted virus response, data points like this underscore that his lack of urgency wasn't based on the warnings coming from his own top officials." A CALL WITH CASSANDRA — Buried on page 75 of the 99 pages of a long-forgotten 2008 National Intelligence Council report, "Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World," is a concise synopsis of almost exactly what has happened with Covid-19 in 2020, our editorial director Blake Hounshell writes. "If a pandemic disease emerges," the authors wrote, "it probably will first occur in an area marked by high population density and close association between humans and animals, such as many areas of China and Southeast Asia, where human populations live in close proximity to livestock. ... Slow public health response would delay the realization that a highly transmissible pathogen had emerged ... Despite limits imposed on international travel, travelers with mild symptoms or who were asymptomatic could carry the disease to other continents." Spooky, right? Let's hope the authors start getting some stuff wrong, because the rest of their forecast was truly bleak: "In this worst case, tens to hundreds of millions of Americans within the US Homeland would become ill and deaths would mount into the tens of millions. Outside the US, critical infrastructure degradation and economic loss on a global scale would result as approximately a third of the worldwide population became ill and hundreds of millions died." Mat Burrows, the lead author of the report, recalls that the pandemic page was "the most edited page" in the whole thing. Why did nobody listen? "Politicians are very optimistic people," Burrows told Blake. "They don't think there's going to be a disaster on their watch." History's lessons — Trump's team is searching through the trenches of presidential history to find inspiration for how to tackle the pandemic. A senior speechwriter for a Cabinet official went back and read FDR's first inaugural for inspiration, White House reporter Gabby Orr says. She explains in the latest edition of POLITICO Dispatch why Trump's preference for catchphrases over more traditional political rhetoric could complicate his response to the crisis. Listen to the latest POLITICO Dispatch podcast Nightly Number 124,021 — U.S. airplane passengers screened on Thursday, as reported by the TSA, a 10-year low. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao said she opposes a domestic shutdown of air travel and that her agency plans to issue guidance on when airlines must offer refunds to passengers who had their flights canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. (h/t energy reporter Anthony Adragna) A deadly year — White House health officials believe extensive testing and prolonged social distancing can hold Covid-19 deaths below 240,000. If that level were reached before the end of 2020, it would become the third leading cause of death in the U.S. Patterson Clark has more. Talking to the Experts What more could large tech companies be doing to respond to the coronavirus crisis? "While I appreciate that some of the online marketplaces have been taking action to prevent price gouging and false claims about products said to prevent, treat or cure COVID-19, there's always more that can be done. Scammers find ways around prevention measures and these marketplaces need to keep up. If they prevent listings based on words in the product descriptions, they need to look out for the same false claims made in the photos showing the products. And while social media platforms are stepping up their game to amplify official information about the novel coronavirus, they need to increase their enforcement even more to remove misinformation and disinformation that can be especially harmful at this time of emergency." — Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), chairman, House Energy & Commerce Committee, as told to technology reporter Steven Overly "It's really important that we make sure personal data is not being compromised or can be compromised. Companies that are suddenly in the news because they're getting used a lot [must] realize they may have a whole new user base coming on to their platforms that aren't used to their platforms. So the more they can be transparent about the give-and-take of e-commerce, as in your data and their revenue stream ... the better for them short term and long term. I think the tech industry has a real opportunity here to show America and the world how they can lead on the issues of privacy and data security." — Rep. Greg Walden (R-Ore.), ranking member, House Energy & Commerce Committee Parting Words THE ITCH TO SNITCH — Mouchards. Chivatos. Spitzel. No matter the language, across Europe, a multitude of aspiring watchmen seem to feel that their moment has finally come, with untold numbers whiling away the hours in self-isolation by keeping an eye on their neighbors' every move — and reporting them to the authorities if they slip up. In the U.K., ever since lockdown measures went into effect March 23, police stations have been inundated with calls from curtain twitchers denouncing neighbors for excessive public outings. The avalanche of complaints about twice-a-day jogs or overly frequent trips to the supermarket has been such that Thames Valley Police Commissioner Anthony Stansfield felt obliged to go on the BBC and urge citizens to stop tattling on one another. A message from Navigator Research: Americans' economic views are souring amidst the growing coronavirus pandemic, and our polling shows they believe Trump is looking out for the wealthy. 70% of Americans now have a negative view of the state of the economy -- a sharp reversal from the beginning of March -- as millions lose their jobs amidst the crisis. This is happening at the same time as Americans - including a majority of independents - overwhelmingly believe Trump's policy response favors the wealthy over working Americans. We are currently experiencing the greatest crisis of our lifetimes -- and public opinion is changing by the day. Stay up to date with "Navigating Coronavirus," a source for daily polling and messaging updates about the pandemic. Visit Navigator Research for the latest insights and sign up for daily updates.   Did someone forward you this email? 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