‘Bad arm!’ Trump blasts ‘disaster’ Fauci in campaign call, slams doctor's baseball pitching

After Dr. Anthony Fauci gave an interview in which he claimed the White House was controlling his media appearances, the president lashed out at him, even taking to comparing how each of them throws a baseball.

“Dr.Tony Fauci says we don’t allow him to do television, and yet I saw him last night on @60Minutes,” Trump tweeted on Monday, referencing the interview where Fauci made his claims about being limited in who he can talk to.

“He seems to get more airtime than anybody since the late, great, Bob Hope,” the president added, referencing the late comedian known for his near-constant rotation on television while he was alive.

Trump said he wants Fauci to “make better decisions” and claimed the original strategy to defeat the pandemic suggested by Fauci was "no masks & let China in." 

On a less serious note, the president slammed Fauci for having a “bad arm” and compared first pitches thrown out by him and the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. He claims Fauci threw out “perhaps the worst first pitch in the history of baseball.”

He then shared a video of him throwing out a first pitch in 2004 and called it “a perfect strike for the American people!”

In a separate video retweeted by the president, Fauci can be seen throwing out a first pitch for the Washington Nationals in July where he doesn’t throw nearly as straight as Trump, with the catcher needing to chase the ball and Fauci shrugging at his efforts.

Trump’s tweets are just a small part of his Monday criticisms against Fauci. He also blasted the doctor in a campaign call reporters were invited to listen to, and then again while speaking to reporters in Phoenix, Arizona.

In the campaign call, Trump reportedly called Fauci a “disaster” and said people are tired of coronavirus and hearing from “Fauci and all these idiots.”

While Fauci has been frequently criticized by conservatives for his support of lockdowns to battle Covid-19, his popularity with Democrats has been growing. Presidential candidate Joe Biden has said he would give Fauci the opportunity to continue working with the White House on the pandemic if he won the election.

Thus, Democrats have not taken Trump’s latest criticisms of the doctor all that well with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) and others targeting the president on social media. 

“After deceptively using Dr. Fauci’s words in a TV ad last week, now Trump is attacking him as a ‘disaster.’ For what? For telling the truth. We all know who the disaster is here, Mr. President. You,” Rep. Adam Schiff (D-California) tweeted.

Biden also released a statement condemning Trump’s Fauci comments and claiming he is waving the “white flag” on the pandemic.

Many conservatives, however, have celebrated Trump so openly targeting and trolling Fauci.

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