Trump urges supporters to expose themselves to deadly pandemic in particularly unsafe environments

But muh equal sovereign dignitude:

The polls paint a bleak picture for Trump, who has counted on broadening his religious support by at least a few percentage points to compensate for weakened appeal with women and suburban populations. One GOP official said the dip in the president’s evangelical support also appeared in internal party polling, but disputed the notion that it had caused panic. Another person close to the campaign described an April survey by the Public Religion Research Institute, which showed a double-digit decline in Trump’s favorability among white evangelicals (-11), white Catholics (-12) and white mainline protestants (-18) from the previous month, as “pretty concerning.”

To safeguard his relationship with religious conservatives, Trump on Friday demanded that America‘s governors permit houses of worship to immediately reopen, and threatened to “override“ state leaders who decline to obey his directive. The announcement — which came days after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention omitted religious institutions in new guidance about industry reopenings — featured clear appeals to white evangelicals, many of whom have long supported Trump’s socially conservative agenda.

The artiscorats state’s rights!

On the one hand, the vast majority of this wavering faction will come home to Daddy Trump. On the other hand, the fact that he’s even worrying about them shows the shape he’s in. And it’s instructive that blue state governors care more about the well-being of these supporters than Trump himself does.

…and, yes, I think a key target audience for this is hack wingnut judges:

The most frightening thing about Trump's threat to order churches reopened isn't that he has the power to do that — he doesn't.

It's that Republican judges will be emboldened to order churches reopened now that the president is calling for it.https://t.co/iQszk3cVfh— Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) May 22, 2020