Media contact: Cynthia Medina, c.medina@rutgers.edu, 848-445-1940
New Brunswick, N.J. (Mar. 24, 2020) – Rutgers scholar Angus Gillespie, an expert in American studies, is available to discuss the parallels of government and media response following the 9/11 attacks to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic response.
“After the events of 9/11, former President Bush regarded the coordinated attack by Osama bin Laden as a surprise. It should not have been,” he said. “Middle East policy experts knew that anti-American grievances had been building up for years. Similarly, when it became clear that COVID-19 had become a pandemic, President Trump said on March 18 that the virus had ‘snuck up on us.’ However, it was not a surprise to the expert epidemiologists who had long warned that the U.S. was vulnerable to a global pandemic. The takeaway is simple. Government works best when presidents pay attention to policy experts and scientists.”
Gillespie is a professor of American studies and author of Twin Towers: The Life of New York City’s World Trade Center.
He can be reached at agillespie@amerstudies.rutgers.edu.
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