People Believe That Trump Could/Could Not Have Predicted the Coronavirus

Coronavirus Test Force, White House photo

Many strange things are occurring in President Donald Trump’s Coronavirus Task Force press briefings, which have become almost daily events: broken promises, attacks on the news media, and outright falsehoods. But let us zoom in on Trump’s number one responsibility-avoidance theme: Trump defends his anemic response to the coronavirus pandemic by saying that no one could have predicted it. How could he be ready for something that no one could predict? Here’s what he said yesterday when asked about major shortages of medical supplies:

“And when this is over, we’re going to be fully stockpiled, which they would have never been, except for a circumstance — this was — this was something that nobody has ever thought could happen to this country.  I’m not even blaming — look, we inherited a broken situation, but I don’t totally blame the people that were before me and this administration.  Nobody would have ever thought a thing like this could have happened.”

Let us focus on Trump's key idea: “this was something that nobody has ever thought could happen to this country.” He repeated it to make sure we didn’t miss it: “Nobody would ever have thought thing like this could have happened.”

I’ll make two points: the first, which the news media outlets have already pointed out, is that the pandemic was predicted. My second point is that Trump’s persuasive tactic capitalizes on an important feature of human psychology.  We often neither fear nor prepare for events that are unlikely. Instead, we tend to be prepared for, and sometimes fear, predictable everyday events. So, Trump’s point that no one could have predicted this event is wrong but potentially convincing.

Yes, people did predict this

Public health authorities have known for many years a viral pandemic could happen at any time.  The Central Intelligence Agency published a report more than 20 years ago entitled, “The Global Infectious Disease Threat and Its Implications for the United States.” The title is self-evident. The report listed several ways that diseases of foreign origin could make their way to the United States. More recently, the United States government knew that the novel coronavirus was circulating in December. Intelligence agencies warned President Trump about the novel coronavirus in January. 

Trump was wrong. It was not just possible to predict a pandemic. The pandemic was, in fact, predicted.

People don’t worry about rare dangers

Remote dangers are hard to think about. Most of us worry about paying the bills, going to the doctor if we have a cold, planning our next vacation, or getting the roof fixed. We face many common, everyday dangers: drunk drivers, heart disease, school shooters, and phony Nigerian princes. Many dangers, however, are rare in our daily lives. A nearby supernova could sterilize the planet. We don’t worry about that too much because a nearby supernova is incredibly unlikely. Consider hurricanes, which pose a more likely danger. I live on the Texas coast. A hurricane could wipe out my neighborhood this fall or the next. I still don’t worry about it a whole lot; it is likely that there will be a bad hurricane next summer or fall, but the odds that it will hit my neighborhood as opposed to some other place in any given year are slim.

The way our brains are wired, we don’t think very much about events that are unusual. But think of it this way. It is unlikely that a hurricane will hit my house next year. It is, however, very likely that a hurricane will hit my house in the next century. We just don’t know when. It could happen in 2020, or it might happen in 2080. It is unlikely that an asteroid will strike the earth during this century, but much more likely that one could hit in the next million years. We just don’t know when. The same is true of a pandemic. A pandemic is certain to occur at some point. Microbes will have their day. But there was no good reason 12 months ago to think that a pandemic would hit this year as opposed to some other year.

Sometimes, however, people do plan for unlikely events. If a state lottery has a big jackpot, people line up by the millions to buy lottery tickets. It’s unlikely that they will win. Sergeant Scott Moore asked Mila Kunis to go to the Marine Ball with him. Seemed unlikely, but she said yes.

What about unlikely epidemics? Modern science has given humanity an edge over many microbes. Public sanitation and modern antibiotics have almost defeated the bubonic plague. We have vaccines for mumps, measles, chickenpox, and the flu. All the same, occasionally, the microbes get an edge on us and attack in force. The 1918 flu pandemic almost killed my paternal grandmother. Even as Americans express skepticism about science, they still seem to think that our nation’s scientific prowess protects us against microbes. Maybe that is why Trump said: “this was something that nobody has ever thought could happen to this country.” Not so much that it couldn’t happen, but it could not happen "to this country.”

President Trump had plenty of warning about the oncoming coronavirus. He dismissed it, presumably thinking that the pandemic was unlikely, or maybe he had too much confidence in his ability to stop it with a travel restriction. Given his strong approval ratings, it seems likely that millions of Trump supporters agree that the pandemic was unlikely and do not hold him responsible for the lack of preparation. Indeed, if you follow right wing media, you’ll notice that many people still do not believe that the pandemic is a big deal.

So, how does Trump's excuse-making work?
So, the point is not that President Donald Trump was right to say that no one could have predicted the pandemic. Of course that is wrong. Instead, the point is that he did not expect it to grow big, and neither did his supporters. His supporters probably agree that the pandemic was not predictable and therefore have every inclination to sympathize with the president when he said that no one could have expected it. 

Psychologists and social scientists have written about psychological concepts like incredulity (a psychological effect that occurs when people don’t believe something that is right before their eyes) and extreme skepticism. Fact-based, hard-logic people would find Trump’s statement incomprehensible. Trump supporters are primed to believe him because many of them are skeptics themselves. For example, many conservatives still think that the coronavirus is a hoax or that the threat is not great.

Public speaking teachers advise their students to identify with the audience’s values and beliefs in order to persuade them. President Trump isn’t big on logic, but he is very good at identifying the values and beliefs that his core supporters hold dear. And one of the values that his supporters hold dear is that they don’t trust scientific experts. That is how his approval rating can rise right along with the pandemic cases. They can agree with Trump that no one could have predicted that a pandemic could strike the United States, and therefore are happy to overlook his weak response.

I found an old but interesting and clearly written incredulity study written by two top psychologists. And here is an important article about skepticism of scientific information about climate change. I suspect that skepticism about pandemic science represents a similar psychological mechanism in which people doubt scientific information that conflicts with their political opinions.