Barack Obama criticizes Trump administration’s coronavirus crisis response.

At an online “virtual” commencement ceremony for Historically Black College and Universities this afternoon, the former US president, Barack Obama, told graduates moments ago about his successor administration’s actions on the pandemic:

More than anything, this pandemic has fully, finally torn back the curtain on the idea that so many of the folks in charge know what they’re doing.

A lot of them aren’t even pretending to be in charge.”

The takedown of the Trump administration’s response to the pandemic is a rare rebuke from a former president. It follows Obama’s leaked remarks last week that the government response to Covid-19 had been “an absolute chaotic disaster”.

But Saturday’s remarks were made openly to likely thousands of graduating students tuned in online.