Yesterday, Trump continued to lie about the threat of coronavirus to children as he pushed schools to reopen without putting in place comprehensive guidelines that would allow them to reopen safely. Medical experts, educators, and parents have sounded the alarm on Trump risking children’s health and safety, but he’s ignored them — as more and more children are getting infected.

Instead of outlining a plan to safely reopen schools, Trump, in an interview with Fox & Friends yesterday, continued to wrongly claim that children are “almost immune” to coronavirus. 

TRUMP: “If you look at children, children are almost — and I would almost say definitely — but almost immune from this disease. … They don’t have a problem. They just don’t have a problem.”

Trump has been pushing these claims even as new research and reports directly debunk it. 

CNN: “Two teens in Florida die of coronavirus complications”

CNN: “Researchers in South Korea have found that children between the ages of 10 and 19 can transmit Covid-19 within a household just as much as adults, according to new research published in the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention journal Emerging Infectious Diseases.”

New York Times: “Infected children have at least as much of the coronavirus in their noses and throats as infected adults, according to the research. Indeed, children younger than age 5 may host up to 100 times as much of the virus in the upper respiratory tract as adults, the authors found.”

AP Fact Check: “Trump’s statements overlook severe COVID-19 illnesses and some deaths of children in the U.S., even though kids in general tend to get less sick from it than adults do. He also glosses over the fact that kids can spread disease without showing symptoms themselves.”

As Trump ignores the advice of experts again and pushes states to reopen schools without the necessary safety measures in place, the lives of students, teachers, and their families are being put at risk.

CBS News: “Two suburban Atlanta school districts that began in-person classes Monday with mask-optional policies face more questions about COVID-19 safety protocols after on-campus pictures showed students packed shoulder-to-shoulder. The day after school resumed, one school announced a second grader tested positive for the coronavirus, forcing the child’s teacher and classmates to be sent home to quarantine for two weeks, CBS affiliate WGCL-TV reports.”

Washington Post: “A Mississippi town welcomed students back to school last week. Now 116 are home in quarantine.”

And across the country, teachers and other school staff are worried about being put at risk by returning to school without safety measures in place. 

NPR: “When it comes to going back to the classroom, 77% of teachers are worried about risking their own health. Robin Stauffer is one of them. She’s taught high school English for four decades, most recently in Katy, Texas, a suburb west of Houston. She says working with kids has kept her young and lighthearted, and she has a strong sense of mission ‘to be the type of teacher that I wish I would have had when I was in public school, to kind of right the wrongs that I experienced.’ But she’s also 66 years old and has diabetes, both of which make her more vulnerable to the coronavirus. According to the U.S. Department of Education, almost 30% of teachers are 50 and older, putting them in a higher-risk category for the virus.”