Ex-GOP House Member: Donald Trump's 'Cake Has Been Baked' On Coronavirus

Former GOP House member Charlie Dent on Thursday cast doubt on President Donald Trump ’s ability to reverse plunging public opinion on his administration’s disastrous handling of the coronavirus pandemic ahead of the 2020 election.

Trump’s “cake has been baked on the pandemic and its response,” ex-Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.) told CNN ’s Alisyn Camerota on “New Day.”

“I don’t think there’s much he can do to improve it right now,” added Dent, who has frequently criticized Trump.

Trump consistently downplayed the public health crisis and prematurely pushed businesses and schools to reopen. Multiple states are now seeing record daily new infections. The president finally acknowledged this week that the pandemic is getting worse. 

Dent, a moderate who quit Congress in 2018,  also questioned Trump’s strategy of attempting to paint himself as a “law and order” president by deploying militarized federal agents to cities, including Portland, Oregon, where they have been unlawfully assaulting people involved in protests that spread nationwide after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.

“This law and order stuff that he’s talking about right now, sending in federal agents into cities, you know, without the consent of the state and local officials is very problematic,” Dent said. “It has to be done collaboratively.”