CNN Medical Analyst Compares Trump to a 'Cult Leader Who is Jumping Off a Cliff'

What was supposed to be a medical discussion on Friday's edition of CNN Newsroom transformed into a full-blown partisan attack on President Trump. When introducing CNN Medical Analyst Dr. Celine Gounder, host Kate Bolduan urged her guest to take "the politics out of it" and focus on "the science and the data" when discussing the risks of the President's outdoors celebration of Independence Day at Mount Rushmore. Gounder did not comply with the request to keep her response apolitical: "This is beyond irresponsible. This is the behavior of a cult leader who is jumping off the cliff except he's jumping off into a safety net where he has protections around him. People around him are being tested, he's being tested on a regular basis while he asks his followers to jump off a cliff into nothing." After slamming Trump's "extremely dangerous behavior," Gounder made a point that actually has some truth to it: "Unfortunately, this has become so politicized where you abide by public health and scientific recommendations on the basis of your political beliefs, not based on the science." According to the media, people who attended the protests in the wake of George Floyd's death, most of whom subscribed to liberal political beliefs, did not have to "abide by public health and scientific recommendations." When Gounder finished speaking, Bolduan claimed that Trump "continues to deny the reality of the data and the science that is coming in" and "continues to lie to the public in the face of a public health crisis." At this point, Gounder jumped back in and accused Trump of "gaslighting."