Bad News — June 17-24

Visa Suspension

President Trump signed an executive order on Monday which will suspend new work visas for hundreds of thousands of foreigners looking to work in America. Although he claimed this new order was due to the economic contraction from the coronavirus outbreak, it appears to be a move to limit immigration more widely — one of Trump’s 2016 campaign promises — as engineers, executives, IT experts, doctors, nurses, au pairs, and spouses of foreigners employed in American countries are now all prevented from working in the U.S. Medical professionals who are working on a coronavirus vaccine and food service employees are exempt. Officials say this move is intended to protect 525,000 American jobs for the rest of the year. But business groups and major tech companies oppose the move, saying it will stifle post-pandemic economic recovery, as many jobs will remain vacant without foreign talent to fill certain roles.

In other immigration news, the European Union is considering barring American travelers from entering EU countries, based on the United States’ failure to contain the coronavirus pandemic. According to draft lists in Brussels, travelers from the U.S., Russia, and Brazil are all persona non grata because of their countries’ (mis)handling of the pandemic. Notably, all three countries were initially dismissive of the outbreak in early 2020; halfway through the year all three are witnessing record numbers of cases, taking first, second and third spots for the most cases globally. EU states will discuss specific criteria for travel exclusions on Wednesday, and measures will be set in place by July 1, when the EU reopens.

Go big or stay home

On Saturday night, President Trump’s re-election campaign hosted their first rally since the coronavirus pandemic began, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, chosen for the state’s lax social distancing rules. There were no measures in place that would limit attendance, require attendees to wear masks, or take any measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The lax regulations are probably also why Oklahoma was reporting record numbers of new cases of the virus last week before the rally. And possibly the reason that six Trump staffers who were working on the rally tested positive for the coronavirus.

The contents of Trump’s 101-minute speech meandered through a defence of confederate statues, and defence of his own ability to walk down a ramp and drink water with one hand (which was met with applause by the crowd). He failed to mention George Floyd or Black Lives Matter, but told the crowd he had asked officials to “slow” down coronavirus testing to prevent the total caseload from the “Kung flu” from increasing.

More than a million tickets were requested for the rally, yet the Tulsa fire marshal reported the size of the crowd was just under 6,200 people — filling less than a third of the 19,000-seat arena. It turns out that TikTok-ers and K-pop fans were responsible for registering hundreds of thousands of tickets with no intention of ever showing up, and encouraging their followers to do the same. Many of these posts were deleted within 24 to 48 hours, in order to prevent the Trump campaign from catching on. Trump has been described as being furious at the size of the crowd. Trever Noah, of The Daily [Socially Distancing] Show, said that the fact that Trump was “foiled by a bunch of meddling kids” means that he is “basically a Scooby-Doo villain now. But at least Scooby-Doo villains wear masks.”

Getting foiled by a bunch of meddling kids means Trump is basically a Scooby-Doo villain now. pic.twitter.com/jYW4Eenzg8

— The Daily Show (@TheDailyShow) June 23, 2020

Speaking of masks, it wouldn’t be a bad idea if we all wore them when we’re in close proximity to others. Whether that means on airplanes (as an American traveler learned last week when he was removed from a flight for refusing to don a mask) or walking around Brasilia, the capital of Brazil, as Jair Bolsonaro learned on Monday. A federal judge ordered the country’s president to rectify his “at best disrespectful” behaviour and wear a face mask when in public, or else face fines of nearly US$400.

Testing Negatively

Trump and Bolsonaro were not the only world leaders who made the news this week for their coronavirus blunders. On Thursday, the U.K. government announced they would be abandoning the NHSX app indented to be used for contact tracing, because it would not work on “millions of phones.” The app, which was supposed to be widely available by mid-May, was tested on the Isle of Wight where it failed to deliver on its promises. Because of its reliance on Bluetooth, it only recognized four percent of people nearby which could hardly provide reliable contact tracing. The NHS is now looking to use a technology developed by Google and Apple — which the government had previously rejected — although it likely won’t be available until at least autumn. It has been estimated that the app cost the U.K. government nearly US$6 million.

France also hit a bump in the road when it came to contact tracing; despite nearly two million downloads of the government’s StopCovid app, only 14 notifications were sent to warn people that they may have come into contact with someone who had tested positive for the virus. The government has said this is likely because users must declare within the app if they have been diagnosed with the virus; to date, only 68 had done so. But, considering the app doesn’t require your name or address when registering, it has been difficult for the government to track exactly who is using the app, who they may have come into contact with, and exactly who has tested positive.

Bad business

The German fintech firm Wirecard’s stock fell more than 85 percent last week after the company acknowledged that €1.9 billion that were ‘missing’ from its financial statements probably didn’t exist. Markus Braun, the company’s CEO, resigned on Friday, and was arrested on Monday on suspicion of inflating the company’s balance sheet and market manipulation. The company, which offers electronic payment transaction services, risk management and physical and virtual bank cards in more than 26 countries around the world, had been a glimmer of hope within German financial circles; now the German government is on damage control, with the Finance Minister saying: “We cannot allow individual companies to destroy the reputation of an entire industry and thus damage the country.”

Bye bye Eskimo Pie

Alongside Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben, Eskimo Pies ice cream bars are rebranding, removing racist imagery and stereotypes from their packaging. Quaker and Nestle, among other brands, are re-evaluating their brand imagery and their complicity in normalizing racism amid the Black Lives Matters protests following George Floyd’s murder at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer.