It couldn't happen to a nicer guy. Incomparable idiot and coronavirus denier Donald Trump has finally ignored the pandemic long enough that it's coming back to bite him in the rear end just before Election Day—when he will absolutely need record Republican turnout in most states to narrow the early voting gap with Democrats.
Right as Trump makes his closing argument to voters, not only are new COVID-19 infections pulsing through some of the Upper Midwestern states he must win for reelection, but Wall Street is starting to doubt Trump's mirage about "rounding the corner" on the virus when a third wave of new infections is clearly underway.
"The Dow Jones industrial average fell by more than 650 points Monday, an approximately 2.3 percent drop, one of the largest single-day declines on the year. After a smaller dip Tuesday, the Dow tumbled more than 943 points Wednesday, or about 3.4 percent," according to The Washington Post. The Dow has tumbled more than 2,400 points since early September, roughly an 8% decline.
Meanwhile, Trump is jetting around the country to his superspreader rallies assuring voters that Biden will land the country in a depression "the likes of which you've never seen."
“This election is a choice between a Trump super recovery and a Biden — in my opinion, this is going to happen; I hate to say it — depression,” Trump told a crowd in Ohio this week, painting a stark vision of boom or bust.
But with coronavirus infection rates simultaneously rising across the U.S. and Europe, Wall Street investors are growing suspicious that Trump's supposed boom is coming. And on top of the surging pandemic, the White House and GOP-led Senate have all but killed another coronavirus stimulus package from reaching struggling Americans anytime soon and boosting consumer spending. Plus, somehow, Senate Republicans ramming through Amy Coney Barrett's Supreme Court confirmation rather than passing stimulus funding hasn't done much to buoy investors.
On Wednesday, Joseph LaVorgna, the chief economist at the White House National Economic Council, tried to pin the stock market dip on Europe.
“Europe is worse, and that spillover is happening, but the difference is in the U.S. is the data looks a lot better than it has in Europe. We’re not going to lock down like they are in Europe,” LaVorgna told the Post. “Europe is leading global stock markets lower.”
Investors are nothing if not capricious and the stock market could rebound in the next couple days if the White House makes some big show of getting more serious about stimulus negotiations with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
But no matter what happens, expect Trump to lie about the stock market. After all, among Trump’s list of first-term accomplishments, the White House included "ending the COVID-19 pandemic."
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