Trump wants America ‘opened up and raring to go’ by Easter

WASHINGTON — President Trump says the country needs to reopen as soon as possible amid the deadly coronavirus pandemic — announcing he wants Americans back out and about by Easter on April 12.
“I would love to have the country opened up and raring to go by Easter,” Trump said during a Fox News virtual town hall Tuesday afternoon, claiming the effect from a recession would be far more devastating than the virus itself.
“We have to put the country to work. You’re going to lose a number of people to the flu but you’re going to lose more people by putting the country into a massive recession,” he said.
Trump has signaled his desire in recent days to have the country’s economy up and running as soon as possible as America approaches the end of a 15-day period of strict social distancing.
The president repeated previous comments that while the regular flu and automobile accidents kill tens of thousands of Americans each year, that didn’t lead to calls to “turn the economy off” or stop automobile production.
“We lose thousands of people a year to the flu but we never turned the economy off. We lose much more than that to automobile accidents. We didn’t call up automobile manufacturers to say, ‘Stop making cars, we don’t want them anymore,'” he said.
Trump described the decision to shut down the country as the most difficult of his presidency.
“It’s been very painful for our country and very destabilizing for our country and we have to go back to work much sooner than previously thought,” he said.