Fauci says he wasn’t asked to join Trump’s Tuesday briefing

Anthony Fauci said Tuesday that he hadn’t been asked to participate in President Trump’s news conference later in the afternoon, which is expected to focus on the novel coronavirus.

“I was not invited up to this point. I am assuming that I’m not going to be there,” Fauci, the top U.S. infectious disease expert, said on CNN roughly an hour before the press conference was scheduled to begin at 5 p.m.

White House guidance on the event did not specify a topic for the briefing, nor did it disclose other officials who would join the president.

Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany wouldn’t answer reporters’ questions earlier about whether other members of the task force, such as Fauci or Deborah Birx, would participate, saying they would need to “tune in to see.”

Fauci said that if he were present for the briefing, he would encourage Americans to take steps recommended by health experts, including wearing masks and practicing social distancing.

“There are really some fundamental things, principles, that if we implemented that I believe we could turn this around in those Southern states, which are getting hit really right now,” Fauci said. He also recommended that state officials close bars in order to address the surge in cases.

“We’ve shown that when you do those things, particularly the physical distancing and the universal use of masks, that you can turn around the kind of surges that we’ve seen,” Fauci continued.

Dr. Anthony Fauci says he was not invited to the White House coronavirus briefing today and says the last time he spoke to President Trump was last week https://t.co/b3a787uR2n pic.twitter.com/8uUO72cYKP

— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) July 21, 2020

In a shift, Trump revealed on Monday that he planned to resume the regular coronavirus briefings, which had been jettisoned in late April after he sparked backlash by suggesting disinfectant could be used to treat patients with COVID-19.

The briefings, which took place almost daily in March and April, often featured Trump and public health officials and sometimes included other guests. Some of them stretched on for hours, veered off topic, and featured spats between Trump and reporters.

McEnany said in an interview on Fox News on Tuesday morning that the briefings would be “short” and would mainly feature Trump “delivering information to the American people that’s needed on therapeutics and vaccines.” McEnany also indicated the briefings would cover topics besides the coronavirus.

Trump is staring down rising disapproval ratings for his handling of the virus, which has killed more than 140,000 people in the U.S., strained hospitals and devastated the country’s economy. A number of states in the Western and Southern parts of the U.S. have seen worrying surges in infections in recent weeks, forcing officials to roll back plans to reopen businesses. Trump has largely downplayed the spikes in cases, attributing them to an increase in testing and calling them “burning embers” that will be put out.