KEY POINTS

  • McEnany said there was no “crisis after crisis” when Trump was president
  • Her claims have been questioned both by the press and politicians
  • McEnany was previously fact-checked for stating that she never lied while being Trump’s press secretary

Former White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany mocked President Joe Biden for what she called "crisis after crisis" occuring under his watch, while downplaying the many crises that played out during Donald Trump’s term.

In a discussion with Fox News host Jesse Watters on the COVID-19 situation in the U.S. and the chaos in Afghanistan, McEnany, who served under Trump, said “When President Trump was president, you didn’t see crisis after crisis,” the Washington Examiner reported. “I shudder to think about what Covid would have been like under Joe Biden,” she added.

McEnany was referring to the ongoing fiasco in Kabul and Biden's response to the pandemic.

Thousands of people still trapped in Afghanistan stare at diminishing chances of evacuation from the country as the Aug. 31 deadline nears, because of the Biden administration's lack of planning and preparation. And the president's attempts to roll out vaccines to all citizens have failed to head off a second wave of COVID-19 infections fueled by the aggressive Delta variant of the virus — threatening to drag down the economy and raising tensions over masking and vaccinations.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has announced that masks should again be worn indoors -- by both vaccinated and unvaccinated people. The U.S. has so far recoreded 39 million COVID-19 infections and nearly 650,000 deaths, according to Worldometer data.

McEnany's comments have since been questioned on Twitter as a clip of her statement made the rounds on the social media platform.

Democratic strategist Chris Hahn tweeted that Trump’s rule was “just a 4 year train wreck followed by a coup attempt.”

But senior legal adviser to Trump’s 2020 campaign, Jenna Ellis, said that when Trump was president “you saw manufactured outrage after manufactured outrage.”

CNN Editor-at-large Chris Cillizza also referred to McEnany’s latest comments as “gaslighting America.” Cilliza listed some of the biggest crises the Trump administration was faced with including the failed impeachment of the president to issues relating to Ukraine, and the Jan. 6 Capitol riots that resulted in the deaths of five people.

Cillizza added that Trump was still president when the pandemic started. The Atlantic has compiled a list of questionable claims made by the business mogul during the early days of the COVID-19 crisis. The magazine included in its list how Trump claimed that the health crisis would be temporary. At that time, Trump said “one day, it’s like a miracle – it will disappear.”

This isn’t the first time McEnany's claims are being questioned and she had also been fact-checked by fact-checking sites for some of those comments. Politifact last year gave the Outnumbered co-host a “pants on fire” rating after telling reporters that Trump “never downplayed the virus,” as opposed to Trump’s March 2020 statement that he “wanted to always play it down” in reference to the pandemic.

McEnany told a conservative group in June that she “never lied” while speaking for the former U.S. president, The Guardian reported. However, the press has doubted whether her claim that she “sourced” information during her press secretary days was true.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, pictured January 2021, is the latest alumna of Donald Trump's administration to join Fox News
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, pictured January 2021, is the latest alumna of Donald Trump's administration to join Fox News AFP / MANDEL NGAN