Pence comes to town to distract from the ineffective leadership in the White House.

MADISON - As Wisconsin nears over 150,000 Wisconsinites who have tested positive for COVID-19, and the state continues to battle skyrocketing cases and economic crisis from Trump’s failed coronavirus response, Mike Pence will head to town to distract from the ineffective leadership in the White House. Here’s what he won’t mention: 

Cases are spiking across Wisconsin, and the state is currently approaching the grim milestone of over 150,000 infections.

• Channel 3000: “Three weeks after surpassing 100,000 all-time cases of the novel coronavirus, Wisconsin is approaching more than 150,000 infections.Combined data from state and county health dashboards showed an additional 2,244* cases of COVID-19 in the state, which makes Wisconsin’s total count of cases since the start of the pandemic 147,769*. Wisconsin hit 100,000 total cases on Sept. 20 — three weeks ago tomorrow, while the state has seen at least 3,000 new infections each of the past two days.”
• Green Bay Press Gazette: “Meanwhile, seven more Wisconsinites died from the virus, bringing the death toll to 1,465 people, according to the state health department.”

The crisis has reached a tipping point in some corners of the state, where doctors say hospitals are nearing capacity, and the state had to create a field hospital to handle the influx of patients.

• Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: “Gov. Tony Evers will open a 530-bed field hospital at State Fair Park next Wednesday to help hospitals in the Fox Valley and northern Wisconsin cope with a surge of COVID-19 patients that is leaving some facilities there with just a few open beds.”
• CNBC: “A hospital in northeast Wisconsin is considering pausing elective procedures as health officials grapple with rising coronavirus cases and a double-digit positivity rate.Dr. Paul Casey, who heads the emergency department for Bellin Health Systems in Green Bay, Wisconsin, told CNBC’s Shepard Smith on Thursday that hospital beds have been at or near capacity over the past week and that it’s weighing on both staff and operations.”

The failed COVID-19 response is also hitting Wisconsin’s economy hard, and experts believe it will take the state even longer to recover given the strength of this new wave of cases.

• Green Bay Post Gazette: “The region's explosion of coronavirus cases doesn't just threaten more lives but could reverse Wisconsin's economic recovery as it infects more of the workforce and saps consumer demand.”
• Green Bay Post Gazette: “More than half of workers in the leisure and hospitality sector either permanently or temporarily lost their jobs in March and April, and the sector still has a long way to go to recover those jobs. Some businesses in this industry that have been unable to reopen even see the need for industry-specific aid for this sector.”

New data confirms that Trump and Pence’s failed COVID-19 response tanked the economy, contracting by 32.6% between April and June. This exacerbated existing economic trouble from the manufacturing recession Trump oversaw from his chaotic trade policies with China.

• Wisconsin Public Radio: “Wisconsin's economy shrunk by an annual rate of 32.6 percent between April and June compared to the first three months of 2020, according to new numbers released Friday from the federal Bureau of Economic Analysis, an agency within the U.S. Department of Commerce. The drop is the highest recorded by the agency since it started tracking quarterly GDP figures for states in 2005. It dwarfs some of the worst losses seen in past quarters, which hover around 8 percent.”
• Politico: “But the White House's trade wars kicked the sector into another slump in 2019, with Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Pennsylvania facing declines or plateaus in manufacturing employment even back in February — well before Covid-19 forced layoffs at dozens of plants. As of July — the most recent month for which data is available — each state is down between 20,000 and 40,000 workers from pre-pandemic levels.”