1 Trump implemented harsher immigration policies than any previous American president. He reduced the legally permitted number of asylum-seeker immigrants by nearly 90% and attempted to institute a "Muslim ban" that was modified and renamed after being struck down several times in the courts. Trump's policy of caging children separated from their families was rolled back after sparking widespread outrage. His campaign vow to "build a wall" on the Mexican border has resulted only in the renovation a few sections of pre-existing fencing.

• Responding to editor comments and criticisms below Here is a shortened version of version 1. Needless to say, it would have been helpful to have some of this constructive participation earlier in the five weeks since the lead revision was first proposed. When evaluating these options, please compare them to the article text and sourcing, which is our guide. Here is option one short version:

  1 short version Trump implemented harsher immigration policies than any previous American president. His policy of caging children separated from their families was rolled back after sparking widespread outrage. His campaign vow to "build a wall" on the Mexican border resulted only in the renovation of a fraction of the preexisting wall.

  @May His Shadow Fall Upon You, Atsme, Scjessey, Onetwothreeip, 1990'sguy, Chetsford, Mandruss, Sdkb, Markbassett, Starship.paint, and MrX:

For comparison, here is the consensus text:

2 During his presidency, Trump ordered a travel ban on citizens from several Muslim-majority countries, citing security concerns; after legal challenges, the Supreme Court upheld the policy's third revision.

3 Trump has advocated a stricter immigration policy: he imposed travel bans on various countries, tightened enforcement of immigration law, and increased migrant detentions and family separations. He also vowed to "build the wall" on the Mexican border but has managed only to renovate mostly renovated pre-existing fencing.

Note: The above proposal was made by User:SPECIFICO. -- MelanieN (talk) 15:38, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

Survey

• Option 1 2600:1702:2340:9470:2874:EE79:5E55:D671 (talk) 02:47, 3 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 - More concise and direct. But as a point of clarity, is the statement that "Trump implemented harsher immigration policies than any previous American president" actually true? There was once a time in American history when only a free white person of "good moral character" could be a citizen - which is definitely harsher than anything Trump did. May His Shadow Fall Upon You ● 📧 14:25, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

• The wording reflects article text and cited sourcing. Also, please note that asylum is not citizenship. SPECIFICO talk 16:16, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

  SPECIFICO, The actual article is a little clearer: "harsher immigration enforcement policies against asylum seekers from Central America than any modern U.S. president before him." That makes sense, and is sourced. The blanket statement that his immigration policies as a whole are harsher than any other US President is dubious. May His Shadow Fall Upon You ● 📧 15:25, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

• Need to see the sources first. Did I overlook them? - ^Atsme _Talk 📧 16:31, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

• Just trying to summarize article text and the sources cited there. None of these cite additional sources not in the article. SPECIFICO talk 22:13, 3 July 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 - I see no reason at all to change the existing text, which has been stable for ages and seems to do the job adequately and concisely. If it ain't broke... -- Scjessey (talk) 16:52, 3 July 2020 (UTC) Update - I am persuaded by the arguments for option 3 or 3.1 enough that I don't object to them. But I stridently oppose option 1. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:26, 5 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 1, unless we're Breitpedia now? Guy (help!) 22:21, 3 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3.1 as option three is the best out of these. The first option is so shamelessly biased that I am surprised anybody would seriously suggest an encyclopaedia publish this. The second option is reasonably neutral but does too much to sanitise the actions of Trump. The third option covers all the important events but is still written to make Trump sound like some sort of clown, rather than have that as a natural implication from the content. It also inadvertently makes some points that are too charitable to Trump, such as that his policies are a matter of enforcing existing laws. I would amend the third option as follows:

  Trump has advocated for and implemented stricter immigration policies such as banning travel from various countries, increased deportations, and increased migrant detentions and family separations. He also vowed to construct a wall along the US-Mexican border.

  I'm not fixed on this particular wording so I'm more than happy for others to modify this. Onetwothreeip (talk) 23:49, 3 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3: This version is both concise, NPOV, and still is able to give satisfactory detail on Trump's immigration policies. Option 1 is too biased -- for example, it says that "only ... a few sections of pre-existing fencing" were "renovat[ed]". "Only" and "a few" is editorializing, and the claim is debatable, since 200 miles have been built, and there's a big difference between the original fencing and the new structures. Other parts, such as "policy of caging children" is clearly POV (the policy was to stop "catch-and-release" and because of the Flores Settlement, separating families was a consequence of the policy), and the travel ban clearly wasn't a Muslim ban by the time the original order was signed, as the text implies (the ban was obviously inspired by the campaign promise, but the text implies that the implemented policy actually was a ban of Muslim people). Lastly, Option 2 only mentions one specific aspect of Trump's immigration policy, so that's why I also don't think it's an appropriate version. --1990'sguy (talk) 00:11, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

I continue to strongly oppose the shortened version of Option 1. The first sentence is patently false -- just compare Trump to the restrictionist presidents of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Also, the word "harsher" isn't encyclopedic and words like "stricter" or "restrictionist" are more descriptive. Also, once again, "caging children" is too emotionalistic (and not purely a Trump Administration policy). The POV word "only" remains in the border wall sentence, and it's inappropriate to word it in the past tense since the wall construction is still ongoing. --1990'sguy (talk) 18:03, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2; (Option 3 is my second choice). Option 1 is just too wordy for a lead that already unnecessarily eclipses the guidance provided us by WP:LEADLENGTH. Chetsford (talk) 04:04, 4 July 2020 (UTC)
• Strong oppose option 1, far too long for the lead of this account of an entire very public life. That's if we have to say anything at all about this in the lead. ―Mandruss ☎ 05:16, 4 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3.1 as proposed by Onetwothreeip. Trump's immigration policies go far beyond the Muslim ban, and this option captures that best while remaining concise. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 06:07, 4 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - keep consensus, (Option 2). Lack good reason(s) to be playing around. Really nothing new to add or improvement here so not good. Longer is actually a bad thing. Playing around during election time just smells fishy, though article already has pings as biased. Giving some respect to established #consensus is desirable. Stability in general is desirable to move closer to a Good Article Criteria, and though article is a long way from GA it should try to move closer not further.

I’ll also note Option 1 is false - I don’t know where such a blithe ‘harsher than any previous American President’ comes from, but obviously contrary to history and blatently vague posturing there, and not part of article body. There’s a long history of harsh immigration treatment, Operation Wetback, Immigration Act of 1924, treatment of the Japanese and before them the German and Irish and Chinese ... and that was to those doing *legal* immigrantion. Try googling and read some, e.g. Salon Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:23, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

Verification not truth, Mr. Bassett. Please read our article text. SPECIFICO talk 14:27, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

This false posturing is not something emerging from the body, let alone in an amount to justify WP:LEAD or putting in such inflammatory blurbism. There is a line for the two whiffy advocacy sources saying more in immigration *enforcement policies* against than any *modern* U.S. president ... but #1 is clearly a false vague posturing. I am only slightly curious where this junk came from, but do not really need to know. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:52, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

Playing around during election time just smells fishy ... Stability in general is desirable to move closer to a Good Article ... oh come on, shall we lock down the article until the election is over? starship.paint (talk) 14:47, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

It’s a thought, but no — and neither should we foolishly ignore that election-year rewrites without reasons is fishy. That is just asking for wasting time on junk. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 16:08, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

I’ll also note Option 3 has a false bit there is barriers where there was none before, and replacement or upgrades of different design to prior obstacles, so “only to renovate pre-existing fencing” is false. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:59, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

@Markbassett: - fixed Option 3 per WP:IAR. Now follows the body. Thank you for catching that. starship.paint (talk) 15:06, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 is no longer sufficient, it focuses on only one aspect of Trump's immigration policies, possibly not the most important aspect. Option 1's first sentence ... is it really supported by the body? (harsher immigration enforcement policies against asylum seekers from Central America than any modern U.S. president before him). policy of caging children separated from their families was rolled back seems a bit misleading, I don't believe every child was caged, as there were different types of facilities. What was supposedly rolled back was the separations, although as our article writes, separations did continue. Not sure whether the caging did continue. Perhaps it did. Option 3 or 3.1 aren't perfect, but right now they are the better choices. starship.paint (talk) 14:47, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

• @Starship.paint: Yes, the article says that.. Maybe you can suggest a tweak to the language regarding kids in cages, since I know you've worked on this content in other articles. SPECIFICO talk 21:55, 4 July 2020 (UTC)
• @Starship.paint: The processing enclosures that are from Obama would still be there and still used during initial processing. Calling the enclosures “cages” is a bit inflammatory and partisan labelling, and they’re not “kept” in the sense as long-term housing. Just saw some more news about fake news about it. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 16:30, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

• Between Option 1 and 2 - Strong oppose to Option 3 and its variants - Option 1 is too detailed, and phrasing like "policy of caging children" may sound good at the dinner table, but not in an encyclopedia. Option 3 omits the significant aspect of the de facto Muslim ban. If we are to expand this material, there should be a mention of the substantial opposition to his policies. - MrX 🖋 15:24, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

  @MrX: Would you support option 3 if it described those banned countries as some variant of "Muslim majority"? Onetwothreeip (talk) 21:09, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

@Onetwothreeip: No, I'm afraid not. - MrX 🖋 22:12, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

• MrX, how would you propose rephrasing the language that describes caging? It's surely been one of the Trump proudest and most widely-covered actions during his time in office and a key part of his attempts at reducing immigration. Let's all review the straightforward language used to describe the separations and kids in cages in our Wikipedia articles on the details [1] [2]. If we are not going to be clear about Trump's immigration policies, we may as well leave the minimal status quo, option 2. But because immigration and American national identity and America First are key to Trump's political posture success, I think more than a minimal sentence is OK for the lead. WP generally reflect mainstream description of all sorts of atrocities, disasters, tragedies, crimes, perversions, and horrible mistakes. Here we're talking about one of the most enduring parts of Trump's public record, not even something about which Trump has expressed any regret or misgivings. So if there's better wording that still conveys the sourcing and article content, that's always welcome. SPECIFICO talk 21:55, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

"Trump's policy of separating children from their families was rolled back..." I'm not in favor of expanding this material at all. But we should have at least a couple of sentences about how famously he has botched the pandemic response, and how he has doubled down on racism.[3][4] We should dump N. Korea and Jerusalem from the lead, as I have said in the past. They are insignificant. - MrX 🖋 22:27, 4 July 2020 (UTC)

• I strongly oppose Version 1, both the original and short versions, as POV and not neutral. Language like “harsher” and “caging” may find its way into the article text, if sufficiently sourced, but absolutely does not belong in the lead. I have upheld version 2, the consensus version, in the past, and still support it, but I now prefer version 3 or 3.1, as being more current and inclusive of his immigration policies in general instead of just focusing on just the travel ban. (Nitpick: I would prefer “multiple countries” instead of the vague-sounding “various countries”.) -- MelanieN (talk) 15:31, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

P.S. Another, stronger reason why versions 1 and 1A are completely unacceptable: the sentence “Trump implemented harsher immigration policies than any previous American president” is false. It grossly misstates and exaggerates the sourced material in the text. As May His Shadow pointed out, the article actually quotes a scholarly source as saying “harsher immigration enforcement policies against asylum seekers from Central America than any modern U.S. president before him.” In fact, many previous administrations have imposed much harsher and even frankly racist limitations on immigration. Ever heard of the Chinese Exclusion Act? For that matter, immigration quotas based on nationality have been common well into modern times. -- MelanieN (talk) 16:20, 5 July 2020 (UTC)

• Option 3 – This new text was workshopped by several editors following a recent peer review of the whole article. The previous text (option 2) is obsolete, as it fails to note two years of developments since the July 2018 consensus wording, and puts too much emphasis on the travel ban's legal history. Trump's stance on immigration, and the policies that he pushed, are arguably the most prominent and consistent features of his presidency. Accordingly they must have representative weight in the lead section paragraph dedicated to policy. Option 1 is not neutral, and uses inflammatory language. — JFG ^talk 05:57, 10 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3- The others are very disingenuous for the fact that neither North Korea nor Venezuela are muslim-majority countries. Option 1 is far worse that Option 2 though. and has severe NPOV violations.--Rusf10 (talk) 17:11, 10 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 3 - Seems the best fit for accuracy and due weight. Option one is to long and unwieldy while giving undue emphasis on certain things, it comes off as POV. While option two is better it could cover more and is out of date. I think three is the best fit. PackMecEng (talk) 15:17, 15 July 2020 (UTC)
• Support a combination of #1 and #2. #3 is unacceptable. To say that Trump "increased... family separations" plays into a right-wing falsehood that Trump was continuing a policy implemented by the Obama administration.[5] FactCheck.Org describes it as "misleading"[6] and the NY Times describes it as "false".[7] We cannot have a lead that pushes falsehoods. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:12, 16 July 2020 (UTC)

Not only does Option #1 have serious POV problems, as multiple editors have pointed out, but it also contains its share of falsehoods and misrepresentations, as editors including MelanieN, Markbassett, and myself have noted. --1990'sguy (talk) 16:19, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

• Option 2 This is the consensus version for a reason. If we are going to change it then we need to show consensus has changed. Would support some clarification about North Korea and Venezuela not being Muslim majority countries though. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Emir of Wikipedia (talk • contribs) 16:43, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
• Option 2 The most concise option of those given. Option 1 (both versions) is very POV, sensationalist, overlength, and uses scare quotes. Parts of it are just plain false – Trump has not made an executive order for "caging children". Option 2 isn't perfect; Trump ordered travel bans for non-Muslim countries and his immigration policies have probably concerned Mexico the most. Option 3 has some improvements (such as replacing "harsher" with "stricter") up until "increased migrant detentions and family separations". This technically falls under "tightened enforcement of immigration law", and it is unencyclopedic to portray a consequence of stronger immigration laws as a policy Trump actually advocates, when he has actually signed an executive order ending family separations^[1][2][3] and advocated keeping families detained together.^[4][5][6] The wall should probably be mentioned in the lede, but the proposed version also uses scare quotes and implies the effort isn't on-going. I prefer Onetwothreeip's more concise suggestion ("He also vowed to construct a wall along the US-Mexican border"). If these issues are addressed, I may support option 3 instead. --Steverci (talk) 21:33, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

• @Steverci: I'm afraid you've got a bit of a straw man argument there. Version 1 states His policy of caging children separated from their families was rolled back after sparking widespread outrage. -- There is no mention of an Executive Order. This was Trump policy elaborated at length by him and Jeff Sessions to terrorize asylum seekers so that they would not come to the US. Please read the cited sources. SPECIFICO talk 00:31, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

Restored from archives, requested closure at WP:ANRFC starship.paint (talk) 10:02, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Why is the article trying to paint a negative picture towards Donald Trump? This is Wikipedia. Not some CNN article where we sit here and try to minimize Trump’s support. HurricaneNerd (talk) 00:04, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Asked and answered many times. See Talk:Donald Trump/Response to claims of bias. ―Mandruss ☎ 00:05, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Y’all sure didn’t include anything negative about Obama or any other lefty presidents. HurricaneNerd (talk) 00:09, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

See WP:GEVAL and WP:OTHERSTUFF. We're not required to create false balance between what you imagine are Manichaean opposites. Ian.thomson (talk) 00:10, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Sorry to piss in ur cereal, but talking bad about a man that is equally as good as Obama is just wrong. Looks like you’ve been watching too much NBC and CNN. HurricaneNerd (talk) 00:14, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

Looks like you don't know what reliable sources are. Ian.thomson (talk) 00:15, 3 October 2020 (UTC)

In the lead section at "working to overturn Obamacare", please replace colloquial "Obamacare" with "the Affordable Care Act" 0x004d (talk) 23:34, 9 July 2020 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to changing it to its formal name as we have done in the body of the article (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare)), but I would first like to see what other editors think about it. - MrX 🖋 01:01, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Here's the sentence in question:

Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic, initially ignoring health recommendations from officials in his administration, and then passing false information to the public about treatments, blaming China, and working to overturn Obamacare putting millions of newly unemployed Americans at risk of losing health coverage.

I really don't like the way this sentence is worded. It would be better like this:

Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic, initially ignoring health recommendations from officials in his administration, and then passing false information to the public about treatments, blaming China, and putting millions of newly unemployed Americans at risk of losing health coverage by working to overturn the Affordable Care Act.

-- Scjessey (talk) 01:29, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Sounds about right to me 2600:1702:2340:9470:AC44:28A1:B377:F8E6 (talk) 01:33, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I'd be OK with that change. -- MelanieN (talk) 01:42, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

That's fine with me too. - MrX 🖋 02:13, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Support and changed. With a link to Affordable Care Act. starship.paint (talk) 04:13, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

• Not ok. Pure SYNTH of cobbled together items. Its should always be written neutrally if possible so...

Critics have claimed that Trump did not react rapidly enough to reduce the spread of the virus and that he ignored some of the health advisor's warnings. Critics have also claimed that Trump passed along false information about the virus, overemphasizing Chinese culpability.

I would leave out the last item entirely as he is by far not the only proponent of efforts to overturn the Affordable Care Act. I know they exist so can we see the references to back up all this? MrX added (maybe this was in earlier?) here with zero supporting references.--MONGO (talk) 04:17, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

@MONGO: - there's no need to say "critics" when the reliable sources themselves are saying so. starship.paint (talk) 04:30, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I agree with Starship.paint. Attribution to an imaginary group is not justifiable. It is an objective fact that Trump has lied and bumbled his way through this crisis. If I'm wrong, the case will have to be made by showing that a preponderance of current sources make these same attributions. - MrX 🖋 11:02, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Starship.paint Thank you for collapsing that, but nope this cherry-picking google only shows that gives situation is unclear result - it included (a) “government slow”, as in Congress etc not “Trump”, and (b) demonstrated “critics” claim this, plus (c) did not consider the RS saying otherwise. Such as it being a mix of good and bad - e.g. Politifact saying “slow” is incorrect or BBC descriptions of things gotten right and wrong. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:46, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Acknowledging the debate over the inclusion of COVID-19 info in the lead section, I believe that "blaming China" lacks specificity and formality. Should the section be reinstated, something like "criticizing the Chinese government's response to the outbreak" or "blaming the Chinese government for their response to the outbreak" would be more appropriate -- 0x004d (talk) 05:52, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Those are fair points, but Trump has been blaming China from the beginning. I agree it lacks formality. As for specificity, it's not just that he blamed them for their response, but also that he blamed them for the virus and that he signaled white supremacists in his base by referring to it as the China virus. If there is a succinct way of saying while also being specific, it eludes me. I guess we could leave it out of the lead since it really only has moderate impact compared to everything else (except Jerusalem and DPRK). - MrX 🖋 10:55, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

user:MrX Factual false bits there. Trump has praised, then criticised, and then praised China’s response. And “blame” ... well that’s only some of the later comments but generally considered true, yes? And naming “China virus” initially was common until it was worldwide and Beijing objected — and later can be tied to politically blaming China as much as this theory of him being racist (like his granddaughter doesn’t have a Chinese nanny and speaks Chinese) or it being some supremacist secret handshake. Just stick to the article for LEAD discussions, and skip outside partisan stuff, OK? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 15:04, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

@Markbassett: Yes, generally Trump has oscillated between adoration and condemnation of China, but I'm not aware he has ever really praised their handling of the pandemic. The virus was originally referred to as the Wuhan virus, as far as I remember. It seems so long ago... - MrX 🖋 18:04, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

user:MrX ??? Not hard to find - googling for ‘coronavirus trump initially praised china’ got me Politico 15 times Trump praised China, CNN The many times Trump praised Bejing, Chicago Tribune Praise, criticism, praise again, Trump praises Xi, Trump hopes you forget he praised China, ... Cheers Markbassett (talk) 02:27, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

I have removed the recently-added COVID-19 reaction in lead section, per two recent RfCs that both reached no consensus. Please do not restore until another discussion reaches a positive consensus. — JFG ^talk 04:34, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Within the next hour User:SPECIFICO restored this new text,[8] in violation of two RfC outcomes,[9][10] while citing the irrelevant WP:SKYBLUE essay. I can't revert because of 1RR, but I request that admins evaluate the situation. Pinging closers TonyBallioni and S Marshall, and admin regulars on this article Awilley, MelanieN and Muboshgu. — JFG ^talk 05:38, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I'm stunned that you would still oppose this JFG, but both RfCs from 6 weeks ago resulted in no consensus. You can't "violate" a no consensus outcome. Trump has been the subject of continuous worldwide coverage for his handing of the pandemic for months. The GOP has tied themselves in knots over it. His re-election prospects are declining as a direct result of it. 135,000 American have died on Markbassett (talk) 02:27, 13 July 2020 (UTC)Trump's watch! Trump owns this because he has ignored the crisis, promoted false cures, blamed the Chinese, blamed Obama, lied, made jokes, held maskless rallies, refused to follow his own health agency's advice, tried to overturn Obamacare, roused his base with glorious visions of confederate flags, and failed to invoke life saving policies. Is this "Still an ongoing story, and not specific to USA or Trump."? Are you standing by your claim that "Pandemic data from various countries shows similar outcomes..."? Are you not aware that the U.S. has 5% of the world population and about 25% of the cases and deaths? As I said, I'm stunned, and a bit appalled that I even have to explain this. - MrX 🖋 10:48, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

in violation of two RfC outcomes. Umm, how can you violate a no consensus rfc? - Harsh (talk) 12:12, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Very simply: in a "no consensus" situation affirmed by RfC, the status quo ante prevails. Quoting from our WP:NOCON policy:

In discussions of proposals to add, modify or remove material in articles, a lack of consensus commonly results in retaining the version of the article as it was prior to the proposal or bold edit.

In this particular instance, that means not mentioning the pandemic in the lead section. The first RfC about this topic reached a "no consensus" outcome on 22 May 2020. A few days later, the situation was debated again in an attempt to establish consensus, and a second RfC was closed with this assessment:[11]

This RfC doesn't reach a consensus about whether to mention coronavirus in the lead of Trump's article. It also doesn't reach a consensus about what to say if we did mention it.

Ignoring this outcome, User:MrX boldly added COVID-19 content to the lead section[12] just four days after the RfC close. Then User:SPECIFICO re-instated the content after I had reverted it. Irrespective of any dispute about the content itself, those are in my opinion serious violations of Wikipedia process, unbecoming of those experienced editors. — JFG ^talk 05:53, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Responding to ping, in my opinion two no-consensus RfCs doesn't mean it can't be mentioned in the Lead, but suggests that the best path forward will be trying to find a compromise. That's best done, in my opinion, through a combination of editing and discussion, and is rarely helped along by straight up reverts (removals and reinstatements). Partial reverts are good, smaller refinements are better. It looks like this may be resolved by vote in the next section below, but I disagree with the premise that you must have agreement on an exact wording before it goes in. You just have to have something palatable enough to both sides so it will stick long enough to be tweaked and refined further. The original "version 1" was too POV and a bit SYNTHy. MelanieN's version seems like enough of a compromise that it gives people a good starting point for further tweaks. ~Awilley (talk) 23:08, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Well for future reference, according to WP:NOCON policy, In discussions of proposals to add, modify or remove material in articles, a lack of consensus commonly results in retaining the version of the article as it was prior to the proposal or bold edit. However, for contentious matters related to living people, a lack of consensus often results in the removal of the contentious matter, regardless of whether the proposal was to add, modify or remove it. We cannot keep having RfCs and Surveys hoping to wear down editors/participation to get a desired outcome. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 15:32, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

A good point. We should have RfCs and surveys where appropriate, but if they come to no consensus then we just move on like normal people instead of trying to wear down participants. --Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 16:05, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

We have to agree and specify the wording before this can go in the lead

Version 1 Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic, initially ignoring health recommendations from officials in his administration, and then passing false information to the public about treatments, blaming China, and putting millions of newly unemployed Americans at risk of losing health coverage by working to overturn the Affordable Care Act.

Version 2 Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic; he issued partial travel bans for China and Europe, but otherwise minimized the threat, ignored or contradicted many health recommendations from officials in his administration, and passed false information to the public about unproven treatments and the availability of testing.

Others can propose other versions; please number them and blockquote them. References are not used in the lead but the material must be present and sourced in the article text. Thoughts? -- MelanieN (talk) 19:59, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

• I support version 2 as proposed. I think any references to the ACA and the administration's attempts to dismantle it aren't really germane to the pandemic response for now. If that were to change and there were reliable sources to support it, I'm sure that it's something that we can revisit. OhKayeSierra (talk) 20:07, 10 July 2020 (UTC)
• Support MelanieN's proposal. -- Scjessey (talk) 20:35, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

• MelanieN and Scjessey, I strongly oppose version 2 on the grounds that the mention in the lead of "issued travel bans for China and Europe" as undue weight and potentially misleading to the reader, especially insofar as the proposed text implies that this was some sort of counterpoint to the minimization of the threat. Indirect flights were never banned; Trump imposed the China travel restrictions only after 12 nations had already done so, and from January 1 to April, at least 430,000 people traveled directly from China, including nearly 40,000 people who made the trip after the travel restrictions were imposed, "many with spotty screening." I would instead support a version 3 that deletes this clause but is otherwise the same as Option 2:

Version 3: Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic; he minimized the threat, ignored or contradicted many health recommendations from officials in his administration, and passed false information to the public about unproven treatments and the availability of testing.

Neutrality^talk 20:44, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I would be OK with that. I mainly included the travel bans because that's the one thing he DID do, and he constantly points it out to show he did something. -- MelanieN (talk) 20:49, 10 July 2020 (UTC) (P.S. I remember a comment at the time: "If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If all you have is a wall, everything looks like an invasion." -- MelanieN (talk) 20:57, 10 July 2020 (UTC) )

@OhKayeSierra and Scjessey: Would you also be OK with Neutrality’s version 3? -- MelanieN (talk) 20:52, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

Seems reasonable to me. OhKayeSierra (talk) 20:59, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

@Neutrality: @MelanieN:, a thought on the travel bans: From what I've seen the travel bans seem to be a central part of the arguments of people defending Trump's response. A well-written Lead section should be balanced and fair, something that even people with strong political leanings can read and say, "Meh, I suppose that's fair." We don't want half our readers to smile and pat themselves on the back for being right while the other half gets angry about how biased Wikipedia is. MONGO's generally a reasonable person. Look as his response below, try to understand his point of view, and then try to meet him half way. There's probably an aspect of WP:DUE to it as well. I suspect that most sources analyzing Trump's response would mention the travel ban, even if only to point out that it wasn't a full ban and that the virus had already arrived anyway. I do understand the concern about calling it a "travel ban" but it could conceivably be called something else like a "partial travel ban" or a "restriction on foreigners entering the U.S." or something like that. ~Awilley (talk) 23:49, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

I still think that (even putting aside the factual accuracy issues I raised above) it's not lead-worthy. Most countries in the world had some sort of travel restrictions; that is typical and expected in a global pandemic. And, as a matter of being an encyclopedia, our job is to accurately reflect the noteworthy facts and circumstances with reasonable, appropriate context; it is not to write articles with the intent of making our readers smile or frown (cf. bothsidesism). The correct way to "go halfway" is to explain what occurred in the body of the article, where we have the space to explain matters accurately in two or three sentences, rather than placing inaccurate or misleading text in the lead section. On a highly trafficked article, we should be scrupulous about this. Neutrality^talk 00:12, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

NPOV is not about giving "equal time" to the false claims about travel bans that Trump and his supporters made in the face of near-universal criticism from notable experts and RS analysis. That would be false balance. The travel ban thing was nonsense, debunked and rejected far and wide in the context of the six month U.S. experience. SPECIFICO talk 00:33, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I actually considered "partial travel ban" as more accurate. I will add it to my Version 2. And Awilley, I hear you about making it balanced. Even though the travel limitations were limited and largely ineffective (since the virus was already here and spreading, we just didn't know it), they are something he did - as opposed to the implication that he did nothing at all. And Neutrality, I disagree that it would be "inaccurate or misleading" to point out that he limited incoming travel from the hotspots. -- MelanieN (talk) 00:18, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

MelanieN: The statement "issued travel bans for China and Europe" is misleading because incoming travel by U.S. nationals and their families from those locations was never restricted. If we wanted to say "imposed partial travel restrictions on foreigners traveling from China and Europe" that would be more accurate (but still inappropriate for the lead section, as this is not one of the most important aspects of Trump's coronavirus activities or of Trump's presidency, let alone Trump's entire life). And even that wording would be imprecise because Hong Kong and Macau were exempt from the ban, and I believe the restrictions on incoming travel from "Europe" applied only to the Schengen Area initially, then also the UK and Ireland, which is not the entirety of Europe. The complexity of the details (and the facts that the travel restrictions were very ineffective) is all the more reason why this ought not to be in the lead section. Neutrality^talk 00:31, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

All of that is covered by the word "partial". -- MelanieN (talk) 00:39, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

MelanieN: Certainly the inclusion of "partial" is better than any version without "partial," but I still think most readers would be very surprised to read "partial travel ban" and then thereafter find out that after the ban, 40,000 Americans directly traveled from China to the U.S. and nearly 8,000 Chinese nationals and foreign residents of Hong Kong and Macao directly traveled to the U.S., plus probably additional thousands from Europe, plus additional thousands on indirect flights. This July 4 AP article said the "ban" was "more like a sieve." Under these facts, the term "ban," even as modified by "partial," can't really capture the porousness. I also don't think it was one of the most important aspects of Trump's presidency, let alone his entire life. Neutrality^talk 01:54, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

Yeah, I would support version 3. Also I have some affinity for the modified version 3 below (although I would edit it slightly). -- Scjessey (talk) 13:47, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I support version 1 as it is more comprehensive..therefore more accurate..there is nothing in it that isn`t true 107.217.84.95 (talk) 21:42, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose all Not sure why we are only emphasizing the negative, always. Trump restricted travel from China before South Korea did and at the same time as 36 other countries did, but after other countries already had a few days to a week prior and the WHO did not even state this was a world health emergency until 1/30. The timing of the travel restrictions is midway between all. Trump used the War Powers Act (perhaps not as fast as he should have) to force manufacturers to produce more PPE. While slower than one would have liked, the US has now tested many more citizens than any other country per million residents except a few. Its important to note that many countries leadership did not do all they could have in retrospect.[13]. No doubt the Trump adminstration could have done more and sooner. Each of the above choices are playing pin the tail on the donkey without an analysis of whether the Trump administration was worse, better or about the same as other world leaders.--MONGO (talk) 22:08, 10 July 2020 (UTC)

We're not emphasizing the negative; we are emphasizing reality. The U.S. is in 23rd place for testing. Trump used the war powers act only after significant hesitation and public pressure to do so, and he used in a very limited way. Hospitals and nursing homes are still getting inadequate PPE supplies, and some are even receiving garbage bag-like PPE without the arm holes! Trump could have done better? How the hell could he have done worse? - MrX 🖋 01:03, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

The U.S. is in 23rd place for testing Sure about that? The US actually ranks 7th in daily tests per million. The only countries with significantly higher testing rates have very small populations. [14]--Rusf10 (talk) 05:05, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I'm sure about that. This source[15] that we have been using throughout our articles covering the pandemic shows the U.S. in 23rd place for tests per 100k people. I'm not certain which part of https://ourworldindata.org/ you are looking at, but the table under the heading 'World map: total tests performed relative to the size of population' shows the U.S. in 15th place for testing, and the source disclaims that it is for "all countries in our dataset" which is different than all countries. The claim "the US has now tested many more citizens than any other country per million residents except a few." is wrong, unless you accept that "few" means "many". - MrX 🖋 15:50, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

My source actually gives you the source they used for every single country. Yours it does for some but others its less clear. And yes I'm looking at the same exact map as you, click on table below the map and you can sort it. Even if we go with your source, almost all of the countries with higher testing are incredibly small. In fact, the total number of tests done by the United States is greater than the total population of all but two of these countries. It not hard to test everyone when your country's total population is roughly 35,000 people.--Rusf10 (talk) 16:43, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I looked into this further and it seems that this has already been discussed and the consensus is that your source Worldometers.info is Not Reliable.--Rusf10 (talk) 16:52, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

A consensus of two is not a consensus, but it doesn't matter anyway. Even according the source you cited, the U.S. is not #1 in testing. Not even close. - MrX 🖋 17:03, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Did you even read the discussion I linked to??? More than two people participated and it was previously discussed here and here. CNN even reported on how unreliable the website is [16]. It is undeniable that it is a flawed website. Also, I never said the US was #1 in testing, so don't put words in my mouth. But no matter how you look at it, its pretty damn close. In fact, if we were to look at total tests rather than tests per capita, one could argue (and again I'm not making that claim) it is #1 with over 41 million tests, unless we include China's likely false claim of over 90 million tests [17].--Rusf10 (talk) 18:07, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

It's not even a little bit close. Your source doesn't support your claim that China is falsifying their numbers. - MrX 🖋 18:38, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes, it does Still, experts have questioned the accuracy of China’s COVID-19 data. It is widely believed that any numbers released by the Chinese government are false. [18] [19] [20]. And will you acknowledge that worldometer.com is not a reliable source? If I see it appear in article space, I will not hesitate to remove it.--Rusf10 (talk) 18:58, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

User:MrX you left out the context of 23rd (now 22nd) “among 214 countries and territories” - so can be said as “roughly top 10%”, or said ‘above average for Western nations’ or ‘somewhere between the U.K. and Canada’... The Covid-19 testing also shows the U.S. as #2 in total tests — all of these are just stating a measure or POV on the data. I don’t mind worldometer per se, as I disagree with excluding reality of POVs exist, but it’s only one POV among many. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:18, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• I support version 3 for the WP:DUEWEIGHT reasons cited by Neutrality. My second choice would version 1. Several sources have taken note of Trump's efforts to overturn Obamacare in the middle of a pandemic and economic crisis, but I also understand that it may overemphasize the importance of this piece of information. Awilley, how have you determined that the travel ban is one of Trump's more noteworthy actions in his handling of the pandemic? We should not be trying to achieve a balance for the sake of placating readers. Our task is to represent material in proportion to its coverage in reliable sources. - MrX 🖋 00:36, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

  @MrX: I haven't determined anything. I just have a hard time imagining a high level secondary source discussing Trump's general pandemic response that goes into enough detail to discuss the downplaying, the contradiction of experts, and the misinformation about drugs and tests, but that fails to mention the travel restriction. I can imagine opinion pieces doing that, or secondary sources focusing specifically on more narrow aspects, but those aren't as useful for determ beining weight as broad secondary or tertiary sources. If you know differently that's fine. I've been wrong before. ~Awilley (talk) 01:40, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

  It would be helpful if you could cite some RS to support you evaluation of WEIGHT wrt the travel bans. I have not seen any mainstream narrative that they were significant, let alone personally bio-noteworthy like e.g. hydroxychloroquine or declining to invoke the emergency production powers or the botched reopening that now sets the US apart from other nations. Could you share sources? SPECIFICO talk 01:54, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I have a problem all options at this point...blaming this on China..the travel bans as well as the issue of trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act all need to be in...however overall the withdraw from the WHO is much more important 2600:1702:2340:9470:69E0:56B7:F967:14AB (talk) 03:18, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I agree that the WHO withdrawal is significant, but it's difficult to cram everything into one sentence, and if we break it up into multiple sentences the lead starts to get unwieldy. - MrX 🖋 15:54, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I think the IP address makes a decent point. Virtually every country in the world adopted some sort of travel restriction, but only one country has taken steps to withdraw from the WHO. If we are going to mention either one in the lead section, the latter seems far more significant than the former, especially given that WHO withdrawal would affect public health far beyond COVID-19. Neutrality^talk 16:17, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

• Support all options, 3 first, then 3-Harsh, then 2, then 1. This is the national crisis of his presidency, with many notable aspects. It is WP:DUE for the lead, and we are way past due not having COVID in. Trump has done much to screw it up, diverging from his own public health officials. starship.paint (talk) 04:42, 11 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose all- The continued attempt to brand Trump a liar by editorializing the lead is unacceptable. The word "false" is used 54 times in this article, but zero times in Obama's article. In Biden's article is is only used twice and one of those times is in reference to something Trump said. This proves that wikipedia selectively "fact checks" since every politician ever has made at least some false statements.--Rusf10 (talk) 04:59, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

• False equivalency, Rusf10. - [21] "'We've had presidents that have lied or misled the country, but we've never had a serial liar before. And that's what we're dealing with here,' said Douglas Brinkley, the prominent Rice University presidential historian." Note that we do not brand Trump a liar in the proposed sentences - we merely state that he passed false information. Now, if you're disputing that he has passed false information, there is a list: [22]. starship.paint (talk) 05:27, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

This is not a policy based argument, nor is it based on what the preponderance of sources have written about the subject. I'm confident that it will be rightfully discounted in any evaluation of consensus. - MrX 🖋 12:33, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Not the way things work, my vote doesn't just get ignored because MrX doesn't like it. There is a policy and it's called NPOV, excessive weight has been given to negativity in this article. You're preferred version doesn't even mention the travel bans and asserts Trump "passed false information to the public about unproven treatments" when the effectiveness of hydroxychlroquine is still disputed [23] --Rusf10 (talk) 00:25, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Actually, if you demonstrate that you are unable to correctly apply NPOV, your view will certainly be discounted. Please review WP:NPOV and consider the discussion of it in this thread above and below. SPECIFICO talk 00:33, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

if you demonstrate that you are unable to correctly apply NPOV Is that a personal attack? I hope not. And who is the arbiter of whether I correctly applied NPOV, you and MrX? I am applying NPOV correctly, those supporting the three options above are not. As per NPOV A neutral point of view neither sympathizes with nor disparages its subject (or what reliable sources say about the subject), although this must sometimes be balanced against clarity. Present opinions and conflicting findings in a disinterested tone. Do not editorialize. When editorial bias towards one particular point of view can be detected the article needs to be fixed. That is what is being ignored here.--Rusf10 (talk) 00:51, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

That quote is about using neutral wording, not NPOV content. Please read the entire page. SPECIFICO talk 02:00, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• User:Rusf10 Good points, that the word ‘false’ is presented an UNDUE number of times. That WP is giving unequal treatment would need to refer to some standard though for any correction - to determine if it should be less white-washing there or less tar-and-feathers here. Also —- perhaps you would want to present article content about the external view of ‘false’, of it being a POV narrative and unprecedented posturing over nits. WP doesn’t need to say the ‘false’ claims as if that is factual or at all important to BLP - it is also a context of being under partisan attack and biased media coverage. To some extent, having it seems just a partisan talking point - something pushed vaguely in every opportunity, regardless of relevance. To some extent it seems just media infotainment selling to a niche - something done by deeply adversarial New York Times and Washington Post and Toronto Sun. Finer discussion of ‘false’ seems more something for the Presidency article, but the frequency here and wording here deserves extra scrutiny and context if it’s going to be said so, so often. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:44, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose all - The way this text is currently written violates WP:NPOV, like Wikipedia is rendering some kind of judgement of his handling of the pandemic, which is entirely inappropriate for an encyclopedia. Obviously COVID should be mentioned in the lead, but written more in a way which summarizes what sources have written about Trump's handling of the pandemic, not passing judgement as it currently is. Just one example, instead of "Trump minimized the threat" write it as "Trump has been accused by health professionals of minimizing the threat" etc. Even just re-wording the sentence like this would help a lot. Basil the Bat Lord (talk) 07:41, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

• @Basil the Bat Lord: - there is no WP:NPOV violation if Wikipedia follows the judgment reliable sources. If reliable sources say: “Health professionals accuse Trump of minimising the threat”, it would be a violation if we wrote: “Trump minimised the threat.” But if the reliable sources wrote “Trump minimised the threat”, then there is no WP:NPOV violation. starship.paint (talk) 15:10, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

@Basil the Bat Lord: If we are "rendering judgement" that would seem to imply that we are writing things that not found in sources. We do not give attribution when something is widely reported and not seriously contested in other reliable sources, per WP:YESPOV. If there are sources that we should consider that say that Trump has not minimized the threat of COVID-19, would you please point them out? Obviously they should be news sources, not opinion columns. - MrX 🖋 15:31, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

@MrX: - the onus would first be on supporters of the content to provide the sources, as I do so below. starship.paint (talk) 02:55, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

WP:ONUS is on those proposing content, and in this case where RS are saying various things - some say slow on this, some say fast on that, some talk about size and not speed... The policy of NPOV is to present all significant POVs in proportion to their WEIGHT in publications, including the right wing ones and the left wing ones. To just pick one POV or message violates NPOV, and is a false representation of events and dialogue. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 18:55, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Having reviewed what the sources say about Trump and the virus, I'd say you would be getting off pretty light with "slow". Have you read our article on Coronavirus in the US? A pretty good NPOV treatment. SPECIFICO talk 21:02, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for hatting all those - but it's a useless list for the NPOV concern. The question is more have you looked at OTHER views and FOR other views, not can you list the cites of the article of the current view. Or whatever that list was. A LEAD position is giving prominence which may be UNDUE prominence per NPOV, and presenting all significant views in DUE proportion means covering both right and left wing. That is not addressed by a list of the existing cites, or whatever that was came from. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 04:48, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

• (edit conflict)Support for option 3, with modification Version 3 (modified) : Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic; he frequently downplayed the threat, ignored or contradicted many health recommendations from experts and officials in his administration including epidemiologist Dr. Anthony Fauci , and passed false information to the public about unproven treatments like hydroxychloroquine, and the availability of testing. - Harsh (talk) 07:44, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I would support that. Dr. Fauci is a highly respected medical expert. - MrX 🖋 15:33, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I would also be OK with Version 3 (modified), if others prefer it to the original Version 3. Neutrality^talk 16:19, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Leave out Fauci. This is Trump's biography; there is no reason to name-drop one expert. -- MelanieN (talk) 23:27, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

• Support 1-3 (Harsh's version)-3 (original version)-2 in that order, but any of them would work. The only completely unacceptable options would be omitting it entirely or trying to hedge it. At this point coverage of COVID-19 has come to completely dominate nearly half a year of his presidency, and these versions broadly reflect its tone and content. With regards to people objecting, above, that this summary makes Trump look unduly bad, that's not our call to make - but outside of a relatively tiny bubble of low-quality Trump-loyalist media this is what the vast majority of sources are saying about his pandemic response, and we have to reflect that. Proposed framings like "critics say" are not appropriate when all reliable media is more or less unanimous; it is an WP:NPOV violation to represent facts as opinions. --Aquillion (talk) 08:11, 11 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - see ABC timeline. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 18:50, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

I'm puzzled as to why you would base your argument on a single news article from April 3(!). April 4-30; all of May; all of June; and July 1-11 also happened. Everything that is in each proposed version is readily supported by numerous sources. - MrX 🖋 19:05, 11 July 2020 (UTC)

Not only that, the ABC timeline itself states that it is a comparison of how New York and the Trump administration responded to the pandemic during the month of March. So we don't have anything from January or February either. starship.paint (talk) 02:59, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose all - The current wording in the lead section is (in my humble opinion) negative in tone. I accept reliable sources have said Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic and that many of his comments and actions have been characterized as racially charged, but the lead doesn't counter-balance any of that with Trump's view of these accusations. I'd prefer either a more concise form of wording in the lead to simply say that Trump has been accused of being slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic or alternatively a brief response from Trump to the accusations. I neither like nor dislike Trump. My concern is that the current wording for the lead in Wiki-voice seems overly negative in tone. Kind Tennis Fan (talk) 01:04, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

  Please review how we define neutrality at WP:NPOV. SPECIFICO talk 01:22, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

  • Yes, I've re-read again the WP:NPOV guidelines and in my humble opinion the current wording for the lead section in Wiki-voice seems overly negative in tone. The only edits in the last three years I've actually made to the Trump article itself have been to provide consistent mdy dates. I know that if I make any edit to provide more balance or to give Trump's response to an accusation it will likely be reverted. Kind Tennis Fan (talk) 01:35, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

A couple of things Kind Tennis Fan. Trump is not reliable source. I should have to even point that out since we an entire article about it. I'm not hearing any "tone" in the proposed text, but would you please point out something specific that is not found in multiple reliable sources? Vague characterization based on your humble opinion are not useful substitutes for our content policies. Let's see your sources. - MrX 🖋 13:05, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

• The Coronavirus Task Force consisting of medical experts and nonmedical personnel was set up on 1/29. I have seen numerous references that Trump did not act swiftly enough with a travel ban and that had he done so he could have saved many lives. However, the Trump Administration issued the partial travel ban with China on 1/31 even though WHO stated on 1/30 that while this was an international health emergency, that they did not believe there was any need to restrict international travel and trade and Dr. Fauci stated that he believed at that time that the virus was a low risk in the US.[34] I have seen many sources stating that the Trump Administration did not enforce a lockdown as early as it should have, however the Trump Administration was partly reliant on an October 2019 Johns Hopkins study that analyzed 195 countries and the determination by them was the US was the best prepared country in the world to deal with such a situation, and Trump cited this on February 26th.[35], though this was pandemic response ability, and predates COVID19. The WHO did not even declare the coronavirus a global pandemic until 3/11 and the Trump Administration stressed a stay at home mandate on 3/16 and recommended visiting bars, restaurants and gatherings of over 10 persons be eliminated and to work from home if possible. By March 16 there had been only 88 deaths, and while of course tragic, this was still far lower than annual flu fatalities.[36], [37]. On March 16 it was reported that, "While more than 181,000 people have caught the virus around the world, almost half have already recovered, and the vast majority of cases remain mild." Yet the Trump Administration was moving to stress a lockdown not long after the pandemic was declared.[38], [39].--MONGO (talk) 07:17, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

  @MONGO: - What you did was interpret information from the sources to argue that Trump wasn't slow. However, your personal opinion of whether Trump acted quickly does not trump the sources themselves. The sources say he was slow, on aspects you did not address. (a) Slow to ramp up testing. (b) Slow to quarantine travelers. (c) Slow to implement travel restrictions on countries other than China. (d) Slow on acquiring or making medical supplies. (e) Slow to acknowledge the threat of COVID-19. (f) Slow to wear a mask in public. To defeat sources saying he was slow, you need to provide sources saying he wasn't slow, instead of making your own arguments. starship.paint (talk) 09:49, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

That's exactly right. WP:OR does not trump WP:V. - MrX 🖋 18:41, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes. Nobody cares whether he was fast or slow or whatever. The mainstream sources, including reports of numerous opinion polls, medical experts, and government officials say he was and for that matter still is slow. Let's wrap this up, MONGO. SPECIFICO talk 19:23, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, been busy IRL. Will address these issues asap. I gave the dates above to show that those two slow issues mentioned are erroneously reported, as Trump was timely with the known details at those dates.--MONGO (talk) 08:19, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

@MONGO: - it is not up to you to prove erroneous reporting. It's up to other reliable sources to prove it, and then you simply provide those other reliable sources which have the proof. starship.paint (talk) 10:48, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• All this talk about the Trump adminstration being slow to distribute testing fails to acknowledge that the CDC wanted to develop its own testing for nationwide distribution and as late as 4/18 the WaPo reported that "Contamination at CDC lab delayed rollout of coronavirus tests". I'm sorry but I do not understand why there is this persistance to ignore other details and assign all blame for the testing kit delays on Donald Trump. Our articles should not be a collection of sticky notes to advocate for a "side". According to the WaPO piece "The troubled segment of the test was not critical to detecting the novel coronavirus, experts said. But after the difficulty emerged, CDC officials took more than a month to remove the unnecessary step from the kits, exacerbating nationwide delays in testing,"[40]--MONGO (talk) 15:29, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

CDC reports to Trump, Mongo. So that is on him. SPECIFICO talk 17:24, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose all. I'm no fan of Trump, my personal views are quite the opposite. But the sort of opinionated editorializing proposed has no place in a neutral Wikipedia article. Saying he was "slow to react" implies that there was some objective path that he should have taken and that it is a proven fact that he didn't take that optimal path. Really though, the choice of what to do in the early days of the pandemic was far from clear - locking down citizens and businesses and closing borders may seem obvious in retrospect, but it was and is highly damaging to the economy and people's livelihoods, so there was always a trade-off involved. The best way to present this sort of information is to attribute the slowness of the response to the reliable sources that have said that rather than stating it in Wikipedia voice, while also mentioning counterarguments given by Trump and anyone else, obviously using the typical WP:Due weight to balance the two sides and if there are more sources saying he was slow than that he wasn't then we simply include more of those. Let's stick to reporting verified 3rd party information and leave our private opinions at the door please.  — Amakuru (talk) 08:30, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

@Amakuru: You seem to be suggesting that we should ignore WP:YESPOV and attribute facts that are not seriously contested in other reliable sources. You refer to "opinionated editorializing", but by whom? Please explain what the other side to injecting disinfectants is and back that up with some sources like Starship.paint has done. What specifically in the any of the proposed versions is "our private opinions"? - MrX 🖋 12:14, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

• Version 4: Trump blamed foreign adversaries and domestic rivals for the crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and said that the virus would disappear as if by magic. He publicly undermined scientists, public health experts, and international institutions, adding to the chaos the pandemic was causing. (Did I leave something out?) And then - off to Walter Reed for a photo op wearing a mask, surrounded by men in full dress uniform. Space4Time3Continuum2x (talk) 15:49, 12 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose all - factually short when it’s saying as if always against when factually he did change; and as if everything slow when some items were fast, and perhaps more importantly some responses have been yuuuuge! Also just not looking to be good summary of article per LEAD, but instead showing wow I could google 10 sites that say X as if that’s impressive. Plus this everything negative negative is just not informative... Say what WAS done, say what WAS opposed say what RESULTED, not just what critics said. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 00:01, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

@Markbassett: I'm afraid I don't understand most of that. Do you have an argument that is based on Wikipedia policy rather than your own analysis, and would you please back it up with source like Starship.paint did? I'm especially interested in you came up with "critics said". Thank you. - MrX 🖋 14:02, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

user:MrX I already mentioned not following LEAD, the rest ....mmm, saying factually incorrect stuff would be failures of ONUS and/or POV and/or V; saying only selected (negative) items without other items of equal or greater significant coverage would be failure of NPOV. The concern of negative negative complaint list or long runaround to just get to somehow a view being uninformative and seems a failure of ENC and CRITICISM which are only guidance essays and not policy. But it would be nice if we didn’t just dismiss when an article is uninformative and negatives as ‘oh but there’s no actual policy about that’ Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:29, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

p.s. as to not understanding the post, well I can try again: I oppose all the offerings stated above, including the existing content, as not a good summary for the subtopic or a summarisation for that part of the article. Whether it is existing text shown in block 1, or the revision block 2 stating it as if overturning Obamacare was started after Covid for the purpose of removing coverage or block 3 stating it as what critics have claimed and solely about the criticsism (as opposed to 1 & 2 stating criticisms as if fact), or block 4 removing travel bans because it seems it gave credit to President Trump, all the offered statements are poor.

In general, I feel it is a factually short portrayal to state things as if President Trump is always against something when his position has changed over time, and it is factually short to declare him slow as if everything is slow and as if that is the only consideration when on some items the response was fast and other qualities of the response such as the quantity or size of response were also important.

Also this is just not looking to be attempting to be a summarisation of the article section. While that section has it's own issues and internal contradictions, that section speaks to the awareness starting circa January 2020, partial travel bans as first response, then initial slowness to do advisors, then the first major bill and declaring National emergency in March, then in April some blame-gaming, then in spring (unclearly stated) urging economic activity to resume, then a sidebar about a 2009 program, and last a bit about Coronavirus briefings winding down after a flap about bleach. Instead the debate iseems diverting into showing someone can google up 10 cites about something ad hoc without any stated relevance to an edit or context of how those cites are found or important or will be used in article text. ---

In short, all these lead proposals seem just dancing away without regard to being encyclopedically informative or portrayling the article. I oppose them all. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 04:23, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

• Comment – As the renewed debate above demonstrates, there is obviously still no consensus among editors about, in the words of the RfC closer S Marshall, "whether to mention coronavirus in the lead", and "what to say if we did mention it". Accordingly, I will remove the disputed content on process grounds. No prejudice to later re-instatement if/when a positive consensus for inclusion is reached. — JFG ^talk 06:05, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Anyone is free to restore the material. We don't count votes, and the "Oppose all" votes lack any real basis in our content policies, and they are not supported by references. They are almost entirely WP:OR. - MrX 🖋 14:02, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose all we ought to all know by now how Trump is usually reported in the news. It's almost always negative, even from where we stand now looking back to some of the things he did that were the right call. Take a look how it's handled in the Andrew Cuomo lead "Cuomo received national attention for his handling of the Coronavirus pandemic in New York" and in the body there - 3 very short paragraphs. The order directing nursing homes to take Covid patients is the direct cause of death for many thousands. New York City alone has more deaths than CA, FL, TX, LA, MI, and GA COMBINED, but barely a peep about any of that on Cuomo's page. It is not always Trump's fault, and Wikipedia doesn't need to be on some mission to say it is. Mr Ernie (talk) 13:04, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

@Mr Ernie: But do you have an argument that is based on Wikipedia policy rather than your own analysis, and would you please back it up with source like Starship.paint did? Thank you. - MrX 🖋 13:56, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Yeah let's try some NPOV on for size and see how it fits. Mr Ernie (talk) 14:06, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

You're arguing against your own position. NPOV is exactly why we have to cover this. It's not a magical incantation that make logic, evidence, reason disappear at will. - MrX 🖋 19:22, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• Comment Some of the arguments favoring Trump's COVID-19 response here are just astonishing. Mainstream media overwhelmingly describes the administration's response as being nine kinds of crap. Just look at the charts showing new cases and deaths and compare them with literally any other "first world" country, and it is clear the US response has SUCKED. Now the good name of Fauci is being dragged through the mud because some of the things he said earlier in the crisis were not accurate, despite the fact that it is a GOOD THING for scientists to revise their recommendations as new data comes in. It is almost impossible to overstate how badly the Trump administration has handled COVID-19, and blanket "oppose all" statements not accompanied by reasonable alternatives are absolutely useless to this discussion. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:16, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Scjessey, I'm not sure I follow you with the statistics. If I compare the deaths per million citizens, Belgium, UK, Italy, Sweden, France, and Spain (countries I would consider "first world") all have worse numbers than the USA. Sure raw numbers are higher in the US, but relative to the population it isn't as drastic. The specifically call out the UK, they have ~1/5 the population of the US but ~1/3 of the amount of deaths. Mr Ernie (talk) 14:04, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

@Mr Ernie: That's because you are looking at the totally of the numbers. Look at the 7-day rolling averages over the last 2 months and note how the number of cases and deaths in the US are increasing (rather alarmingly, in fact), but that is not the case in most other developed countries. Here's a good source: Our World In Data, but there are many others. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:17, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Ernie, pictures: charts here. Click on the US and click on Germany, France, Italy and other similar nations. Every day you can find graphs and analysis in the mainstream US media that show that the rest of the "first world" countries have suppressed the surge, while the US is setting new highs daily. Have you read the mainstream coverage of the coronavirus? That is what we are using to write this article and Starship.paint has provided many RS references on the issue. SPECIFICO talk 14:54, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

If people want to read mainstream coverage of the crisis, they can do it on sites that deliver mainstream coverage. Wikipedia is supposed to be different from that. Mr Ernie (talk) 16:20, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

WRONG. Wikipedia articles rely entirely on reliable sources, and when it comes to politics that means most sources are from the mainstream media. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:44, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose All - Overall too complicated and messy for the lead that gives undue weight to certain aspects. I have no issue mentioning COVID in the lead, just not in such a nakedly POV way. Honestly the section in this article about it could use a lot of work as well. It has way to much trivia and reads like a news of the day ticker. PackMecEng (talk) 04:09, 14 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose - it's not exactly impartial. It's true that Trump has made many misleading and false statements - I just looked up the phrase "Trump" on Google and the first two things that come up are News headlines - "America shuts down again: choosing reality of Trump's false claims", and "Trump may be no good at leading America - but he's really, really good at lying". Rather damning search results, and not ones you'd want to see as a President with an election coming up. Nevertheless, the way you phrased it leaves too much room for interpretation: the question is, how MUCH did he contradict health officials and make false statements? And the average reader will look at that and be unsure. Trump could've contradicted health officials only very slightly, once or twice, and you just don't know. I think it's just the general feel - it's too general and thus sounds too biased, and that's not what we're trying to accomplish here. --121.99.126.230 (talk) 14:00, 14 July 2020 (UTC)
• Support Version 3. We stick to what RS say. The content is clearly WP:DUE and WP:NPOV. Focus on the travel bans is undue for the reasons laid out by User:Neutrality. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 03:14, 16 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose All - Especially since we are talking about the Lead section here. I do not believe the wording "passing false information to the public" is worded in a NPOV way at all. --Malerooster (talk) 17:22, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

• "Passing" is not NPOV? Would it be better "Declaring false information"? "Promoting false information"? How would you correct the wording? SPECIFICO talk 19:08, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

At this point, 14 editors favor including this material and 10 oppose it. Some editors have not given reasons for support or opposition, but I am more concerning that several editors have opposed for reasons that do not seem to be grounded in policy or by making bare assertions without any supporting evidence. - MrX 🖋 17:57, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Something of course needs be in the lead on this matter but not the wording proposed so far.--MONGO (talk) 18:02, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

I counted 11 to 11 - but it's hard to count when some of the comments are not the traditional bold support or oppose iVotes. Regardless, the number of iVotes shouldn't matter anyway - it's about the weight of the arguments. Based on what I've read, the exclusions carry far more weight considering the reality and who should be held accountable per Politico, NBC, US News, and local CBS news. There are plenty more if needed. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 19:01, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

The concerted effort to omit, when the brief mention accurately reflects long-established consensus article text isn't helping improve the article. The text is back in the article now and it should stay there. Naturally, editors are free to suggest improvements. SPECIFICO talk 19:08, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

The concerted effort to include, when the brief mention does not accurately reflects long-established consensus article text isn't helping improve the article. The text is back out of article now and it should stay out. Naturally, editors are free to suggest improvements. --Malerooster (talk) 21:21, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

There are 15 in favor (with the new comment from FeldBum) and 10 opposed.(BTW, it's not hard to count or evaluate consensus in this discussion). Editors like Amura and Atsme have not responded to good faith requests to substantiate their weak arguments. Contrarily, starship.paint has provided a treasure trove of evidence to support every word of the prosed text in each of its forms. - MrX 🖋 22:07, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Support Version Two. Seems the fairest and most NPOV. --FeldBum (talk) 19:13, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

• Support Version 3, because it's the truth. To omit this information from the lead would violate basically every tenet of Wikipedia. Calidum 04:50, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
• Support Version 3 per Snooganssnoogans. Mgasparin (talk) 22:59, 18 July 2020 (UTC)
• Support Version 3, which is NPOV and gives due weight to the most important things. But support anything, even option 1 (which I think strays into POV territory) over having nothing at all. I know it's hard to reach consensus here, and I think most people here are not intentionally trying to WP:STATUSQUOSTONEWALL, but in aggregate, that's the effect. That we still have nothing in the lead on the defining crisis of Trump's presidency at this point reflects a breakdown in our processes. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk
• Support version 3. OK with 2 or 1 – Clearly due, neutral, and likely the most important part of his legacy. O3000 (talk) 15:51, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Mainstream sources for content in dispute

These sources prove that it is perfectly fine for Wikipedia to take a negative view of Trump's handling of the pandemic, because that is the same view of the reliable sources. Amakuru - I refer you to the above, there are far more aspects than just locking down citizens and businesses and closing borders. Would you suggest we incorporate all of these sources given that the article's large size has been flagged as an issue? starship.paint (talk) 09:49, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Excellent work and thank you Starship.paint. This certain undermines all of the "Oppose all" arguments I've seen which can be best summed up as "I don't like it because Trump disagrees, and I'm not taking any questions." - MrX 🖋 12:27, 12 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for folding those, but again - that one can google up ‘some cites say’ for one POV has been done and disproven before. Just google without the filters and the perfect picture falls apart — other views and more facts get in. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 02:45, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

@Markbassett: - it's remarkably easy for you to merely claim that I have cherrypicked sources. What's harder is for you to prove that I have indeed cherrypicked. If the POV of my sources is in fact the minority POV, then you should be able to simply match what I did. I provided 15 articles from 11 reliable organizations, covering 6 aspects of Trump's lack of speed during this crisis, you can do the same for Trump's speed - 15 articles, 11 organizations, 6 aspects. This shouldn't be difficult if I actually did cherrypicked sources, you can Just google without the filters, and other views and more facts get in. So, prove it. starship.paint (talk) 10:43, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Starship.paint “cherry picked” is your word, and thank you for collapsing the useless lists. But what you need to respond to is that those failed ONUS because they’re not applied towards anything and because one can google up 10 cites for just about every POV, and it is a bit unusable for the thread to just drop in ‘here are some urls’ without context of how gotten and which proposed wording is intended to be cited for what. We’re not going to give 40 cites for any line chosen, and LEAD really should be from body content and cites not an unrelated score of urls. Just umpteen hits at undefined randomness is basically useless and TLDR. There are billions of links on web - saying a number like 10 or 15 as if that is at all significant is just silly, you need to show something like appearance in all POV publications or WEIGHT in millions for a topic, and explain the phrase it is intended to go to. I can equally turn up URLs for say Fauci praised President Trumps travel ban and travel restrictions. That you did an example (or above several) simply does nothing for DUE or OFFTOPIC or picking which particular hit for relevance and information instead of SENSATION or POV. So show a few million hits and maybe you’ve got DUE. Show it from BBC and not just NYT and maybe you’ve got widely said. Show it actually is part of an impact on President Trumps life and you’ve got BLP instead of OFFTOPIC. But showing me just 10 hits from the usual partisan sources NYT et al.... just isn’t anything. Not even showing enough DUE for a ‘critics said’. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:12, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

@Markbassett: - you expect WEIGHT in millions, yet you provided only one source, from a source of questionable reliability (see WP:RSP, Townhall is yellow), reporting on a Trump administration member's praise of Trump, on just one aspect of his response. Asking for a few million hits is both nonsensical and unreasonable, because Google hits aren't necessarily reliable sources, and even if they were, I could not possibly check a few million hits for verifiability. Demanding BBC and not just NYT is not even needed, I have the Associated Press, France 24, Kaiser Health News, and NPR. But I will oblige you. Behold, the BBC, as you requested [60]. starship.paint (talk) 09:36, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Starship.paint again you did not get the point -- that this dumping unexplained lists of about 10 cites is unusable and just meaningless. You didn't give context of how that was crafted; or which edit wording it was intended to support; or even if those are cites in this article or the other one or intended to be added somehow. You just dumped a load into TALK. thank you for at least hatting it, but of circa one billion hits in Google finding a dozen for any particular POV does not do anything to show it is significant or that other POVs do not exist. Just say what was the point of the list and how you made it and how you intend it to be used -- and if your answer is to show 'only my view is right' then I'll be glad to come back with ELEVEN cites about other view, or maybe 10 cites to places saying silly stuff like that's a chihuahua on his head or he's really the love child of a werewolf. Again, just dropping 10 urls just doesn't ring as if that's a significant portion let alone as all the POVs. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 18:40, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

p.s. ah. On re-looking -- while I did not say "cherry-picking" about this set of collapsed urls, I must admit that I *did* say it about the earlier list of 6. So I think it is reasonable for you to have thought the concern about that set of urls also applied to the these several herds of urls. At any rate, I would appreciate clarification for any such list -- exactly what is it that we're looking at and what is the editing intent of it. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 14:24, 15 July 2020 (UTC)

• How soon we forget: BBC February 1, 2020 - US Health Secretary Alex Azar said "Following the World Health Organization decision, I have today declared that the coronavirus represents a public health emergency in the United States," he told reporters. The information that shows up in a Google search depends on the keywords you use. NYTimes: Surgeon General Urges the Public to Stop Buying Face Masks, NPR: Doctors Say Hospitals Are Stopping Them From Wearing Masks. It goes on and on. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 19:21, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Is there a point to posting these outdated sources? They don't seem to really relate to the discussion at hand. - MrX 🖋 22:17, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

It's particularly funny given that Trump is STILL claiming COVID19 will just "go away" without a vaccine. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:53, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

Generally running “Oppose all” so now what ?

Things above seem to have gotten lots of pushback and diverging into side topics, so I thought it time to open a subthread looking for the now what...

1. Can we agree that response above is generally or commonly running to “Oppose all”  ?

Not to do the !count thing, it just seems to me..... a lot of oppose “all” (unusually broad), does not seem anywhere near any one proposed line favored or a progress for defining need or approach to a consensus edit on even a part-line tweak.

2. If so, then now what ?

I think the original thread and all proposals are toast, and this one can close soon. But maybe there are some items worth note ? Maybe noting what general LEAD principles are of interest, such as edit body first? Or a side discussion worth spinning a new thread for ?

Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:46, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

- - - -

No we cannot. Opposing without stating valid policy based reasons and while refusing to respond to good faith questions does not carry much weight. This is not a vote. On the merits, I believe there is rough consensus for inclusion. By the way, would you PLEASE strive for clarity, brevity, and complete sentences in your comments? Thank you. - MrX 🖋 01:24, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

user:MrX OK, you're being unclear. Was that 'No' for #1 ? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 05:12, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

Again..I believe dropping out of the WHO should be a priority 2600:1702:2340:9470:E8B9:764D:AE19:DFE7 (talk) 00:25, 14 July 2020 (UTC)

No, Mark, "Oppose all" is certainly not a consensus takeaway from the above discussion. You yourself have repeatedly urged against putting anything in the lead, but that does not decide the outcome. Discussants here have not agreed on "oppose all," and the proposed wordings are not "all toast". While you have been opposing everything, a lot of people have been discussing options for the wording with a clear intent that something needs to be in the lead. The massive lists of sources provided above by starship.paint (thoughtfully put under hats so as not to overwhelm the article) provide strong support for inclusion. So does the "edit body" material, which as you pointed out needs to be considered when discussing the lead; there is a 9-paragraph section already in the article. -- MelanieN (talk) 21:38, 17 July 2020 (UTC)

User:MelanieN Factually the answers above *did* run to a lot of "Oppose All" -- with that exact phrasing in many cases and the general theme in many more of the discussions also having a strong 'no not that' flavor. The phrasings as shown in proposals seem toasted enough to me, and note the discussion moved along from there. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 18:54, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Finding common ground (Covid)

If this is to be resolved by !vote, it might make sense to try and find which items have the most agreement and which are the most contentious. Here's a list of things that could conceivably be included in a Lead sentence, pulling from the versions and comments above and from the body of the article.

A. Slow to address pandemic

B. Downplayed severity

C. Ignored or contradicted health recommendations from officials

D. Promoted unproven treatments

E. Passed on false information about test availability and/or vaccine timeline

F. Blamed China/media/democrats/WHO

G. Began withdrawing the US from the WHO

H. Worked to overturn Obamacare

I-1. Focused on economic impact

I-2. Pushed for opening up economies and schools early - added by Neutrality

I-2a Pushed for early reopening of businesses and and other activities, leading to a rapid escalation of the pandemic in early summer, 2020. - added by SPECIFICO

J-1. Invoked wartime production act

J-2. Failed to use the powers of the Wartime Production Act, resulting in ongoing shortages of testing capability and medical supplies. - added by SPECIFICO

K. Issued limited (or "partial") travel ban/restriction(s)

L-1. Signed multi-trillion dollar stimulus

L-2. Signed multi-trillion dollar stimulus, making clear that the stimulus was enacted by Congress almost unanimously - added by Neutrality

M. Attribute some of the critical items (For example: "Critics say Trump was slow to address..." or "Trump was widely criticized for...")

N. U.S. had the world's most confirmed active cases and deaths. - added by Neutrality

O. U.S. had roughly X million cases and Y million deaths. - added by Neutrality

P. Shifted responsibility to the individual states - added by Awilley

Please indicate which of the above you think are or aren't notable enough for Lead inclusion based on the body of sources. And feel free to add items to the list, within reason. ~Awilley (talk) 04:46, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

I have taken the liberty of adding options I-2, L-2, N, and O. Neutrality^talk 15:59, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

I am adding J-2 - failed to use wartime production act powers, resulting in ongoing shortfalls in testing and medical PPP supplies as cases soared. SPECIFICO talk 16:27, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

Awilley, why don't you simply close the previous discussion or alternatively audit MrX's assessment of its consensus? SPECIFICO talk 13:30, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

SPECIFICO, I started this partly based on the complaint that the "oppose all" editors were not offering alternatives, responding to questions, or offering reasonable compromises. diff This isn't something where I expect some admin to make a table and close. My hope was that it would be helpful for the editors themselves to see the points of opposition and common ground. That kind of knowledge is helpful for someone trying to edit a compromise/consensus wording. My other motivation was to help avoid having a close that permanently locks in a wording that 7 out of 20 editors adamantly oppose and had zero input in framing. "Tyranny of the majority" always works when other methods of dispute resolution break down, but it's not the healthiest way of doing things for what should be a collaborative encyclopedia building effort. ~Awilley (talk) 14:48, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks for the reply. When editors are simply refusing to collaborate in the face of carefully reasoned evidence and a lot of effort to articulate sourcing and the relation to article content, I don't see any prospect that compromise was on the table. MrX offered a good valid version. It may not be perfect, it may change over time, of course. But nothing would have "locked in" that wording. When we have editors who deny NPOV, falsely argue that RfC's support edit-warring, etc., I don't think we need to consider grand abstractions like "tyrrany of the majority. We don't work on majority. We work on consensus, which was clearly approximated by MrX's edit and could have been modified or improved at any time. To quote an alternative grand principle, Perfect is the enemy of good. When you have editors indignantly and falsely claiming some sort of process abuse while edit-warring, it's usually a tip-off to take a fresh look. Content creators like @Starship.paint: go to a lot of trouble to find sources and policy based solutions. It's demoralizing to them and everyone else to be blocked by editors who offer no such commitment or collaboration in return. Do you see any reasoned argument against the text crafted by @MrX:? Nobody has stated any AFAIK. SPECIFICO talk 16:47, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

I haven't edit warred or refused to collaborate. I have offered a viable compromise and neutral version below. Being that this is the greatest crisis Trump has faced in his Presidency, it deserves certainly as much attention as his falsehoods issues and I included his blunders as supported by the RSs.--MONGO (talk) 18:00, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Nobody accused you of anything, MONGO, let alone edit-warring to keep Covid out of the lead. Sounds like you agree it's a non-starter to claim that coronavirus does not belong in the lead. Great! SPECIFICO talk 18:39, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

Not seeing that anyone opposed anything except the wording and tone. Attacking others just because they disagree with your stance is not helpful.--MONGO (talk) 19:56, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

It's demoralizing to them and everyone else I'm just curious how you know what's demoralizing to other people, SPECIFICO. Please refrain from presuming to speak for others, as I've asked you to do multiple times before. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:21, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

• This will repeat some elements of Option 3 above and my comments above, but I:

• support Option A, B, C, D, E, F, and G, which are consistent, continuing themes of Trump's activities during the pandemic and main focuses of the high-quality reliable sources. I believe that most of these options already have rough consensus as reflected above.
• I also support including Option N and O, since I think giving the reader an idea of the scale of the pandemic in the U.S., and how the U.S. performed relative to the rest of the world.
• I strongly oppose Option M since it would not be supported by the sources and would go against fundamental encyclopedia policy, which is that we state facts as facts and we don't need in-text attribution unless a notion is seriously contested.
• I oppose Option I-1 because "focused on economic impact" is vague, but I would support including Option I-2 and Option I-2a because that is far more significant and specific (while also concise). I do understand that I-2 overlaps with C ("Ignored or contradicted health recommendations from officials"), so we would have to finesse it somehow.
• I oppose Option J-1 (Defense Production Act) because it would seem to omit the mention that Trump delayed invoking the Act, which is the most important part of this theme and the continuing focus of coverage (four days ago: "Trump administration's delayed use of 1950s law leads to critical supplies shortages"). A modified version of J could be framed to include this context, but I am neutral, lean oppose on such a version mostly for space reasons.
• I oppose Option K as incomplete/misleading for the reasons I extensively explained above: even after the "travel ban," 40,000 Americans directly traveled from China to the U.S. and nearly 8,000 Chinese nationals and foreign residents of Hong Kong and Macao directly traveled to the U.S., plus probably additional thousands from Europe, plus additional thousands on indirect flights, which is why the hgh-quality sources describe the "ban" as "more like a sieve" with "spotty screening."
• I oppose Option L-1 (multi-trillion dollar stimulus) because it lacks context, which is that the law was enacted by Congress almost unanimously (i.e., on a bipartisan basis); I am neutral, leaning oppose on Option L-2, which would include that key context (lean oppose for space constraints).
• I am neutral on Option H; I think the efforts to undermine/strike down the ACA are important enough to include in some part of the lead, but those obviously didn't occur solely, or even mostly, in the context of the pandemic.

Neutrality^talk 16:12, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

SPECIFICO, can you consider striking Option J-2 and proposing a similar Option J-3, changing the text "failed to use the powers of the Wartime Production Act..." to "delayed invoking the Defense Production Act"? I think this is what you meant. Starship.paint is correct that Option J-2 as written isn't accurate. Neutrality^talk 18:15, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

My understanding is that he announced invoking it but has not used its authority to mandate industrial production. Instead he went on a roadshow of a few companies making supplies and equipment but without using his authority to force pricing production and distribution. Then we continued to hear about states bidding against one another and the shortfall in ventilators and PPE and testing components has persisted to this day. Do we have sourcing that he exercised his emergency powers? SPECIFICO talk 18:21, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

CNN says: "19 companies that have received contracts under the Defense Production Act....But experts say it's not enough and that the effort started far too late." Neutrality^talk 18:33, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

With due appreciation to Awilley for trying to help resolve this, we now have +/- a 12x12 matrix, with rows of content and columns of editors, each cell a (1 or 0). Some editors have insisted that only rows with all ones should go in the lead. Well, per previous discussion and reverting, that's not going to happen. But it is likely to delay any lead content for another month or more. Formalizing this makes it feel more like a vote, when the problem is still just to reasonably summarize the already-existing -- and quite moderate -- article text that was achieved through extended discussion. What are we going to do with dozens or hundreds of votes here? In short, I don't believe that schematizing the talk discussion can resolve the crux of the problem, which is the insistent denials that have tied this up for 5 months. SPECIFICO talk 21:02, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

• Some editors have insisted that only rows with all ones should go in the lead. I haven't seen that, but it's counter to the second sentence at WP:CON and therefore irrelevant. Unanimity is never required for anything that I'm aware of, and certainly not for this.
• If there was a consensus on the definition of reasonably summarize in this case, I suspect Awilley wouldn't have seen the need for this subsection. Most of the listed items are present in the COVID-19 section or the rest of the article, and our options are:

• decide which few are the most leadworthy, or
• say nothing in the lead (which would suit me fine).

• We're sorry that necessary process is taking longer, again. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:41, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

Someone could ignore the process, but I imagine their edit would not last long on this article. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 21:49, 18 July 2020 (UTC)

Oh yes, most of us are quite aware unanimity is not required. Tell that to the folks who have edit warred to remove every shred of the solid consensus text from the article. Starting with the initial premature RfC where the abort RfC consensus was disregarded down to the most recent removal of MrX's innocuous text summarizing the article, this process has been broken. It's nonsense to pretend this is normal process of any sort or that it will be resolved with yet more polls and holdouts by those whose views are in the scant minority. SPECIFICO talk 00:23, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

• Support G and H with Obama care reading Affordable Care Act 2600:1702:2340:9470:200B:8D97:705A:F35B (talk) 01:45, 19 July 2020 (UTC)
• Poorly formed question- This cannot possibly lead to a consensus. Giving people nearly 20 different options to piece together a sentence is not going to help and I'm not going waste my time voting on this.--Rusf10 (talk) 20:12, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

  I disagree. I think it's the only possible path to a clear and durable consensus for something in the lead. We do need a certain level of participation for this to work, and I hear that you're not going to contribute yours. Ok. (As for why I haven't contributed mine, I'm not being hypocritical. My long-standing position has been that this article covers too much about the presidency, and that its lead summarizes too much about the presidency. Over all too much emphasis on the presidency, merely because the article has high visibility. Having apparently lost that battle, I usually sit these things out.) ―Mandruss ☎ 20:30, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

  This section does not supersede the previous and ongoing discussion. Anyway Trump's reaction to the virus is clearly the most personal and idiosyncratic expression of his personality and behavior. It is much more fitting in the bio than most of the presidency-related content already in place. SPECIFICO talk 20:43, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

  @SPECIFICO: Ok, throw me a bone in the form of a link to a reasonably clear consensus for lead language on COVID-19. I think I've been around long enough to know what a reasonably clear consensus looks like, and we can't add anything without one. If there is a consensus, anybody obstructing its implementation is guilty of disruption and should probably be taken to AE instead of your current approach. My guess is that there is no reasonably clear consensus, however, which is why we're here. ―Mandruss ☎ 20:53, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

  My approach?? Not me. Error? Your views on consensus seem to change week to week. Anyway consensus is not unanimity. The nonsense claims of prior consensus to exclude might be AE-worthy if you are so inclined. SPECIFICO talk 20:59, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

  Your views on consensus seem to change week to week. - Diffs, please? "No consensus to omit" is NOT the same as "consensus to include", and consensus is required to include any disputed content, particularly in this article's lead. Do you dispute that this content is disputed? Anyway consensus is not unanimity. As I clearly said already. I also said that anybody claiming to require unanimity is full of shit. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:09, 19 July 2020 (UTC)

  Oh. Well after you muck the stall, you will find that what's left is an overwhelming consensus among the remaining. And don't forget this latest round of edit warring to keep the consensus text out was started on the preposterous false pretext that a disruptive RfC, wherein the dominant view was Abort, somehow made the edit war legitimate. SPECIFICO talk 00:34, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

  Still waiting for that bone. ―Mandruss ☎ 01:52, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

• I am in agreement with Neutrality on the following points: Support A, B, C, D, E, F, and G / Oppose I-1, J-1, L-1, M / Neutral to H and L-2. As for the rest, J-2 is inaccurate, I believe Trump did use the DPA, although he didn't use it extensively enough or early enough. For K, oppose if described as a ban, because of a misleading impression, there were indeed holes for Americans and some foreigners to arrive, also oppose if it is not clarified that only foreigners were affected. For N and O, not needed in the lead, let's focus on Trump's actions. starship.paint (talk) 01:24, 20 July 2020 (UTC)
• I support A-to-G, I-2, L-2, N, and O (if forced to remove 3 of the items I support, I'd remove D,E,F which are lower priority). Given space constraints, I oppose H, J1/J2, and K. I oppose M because it frames uncontested description by RS as criticisms. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 23:46, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

There was consensus for the text added by @MrX:. It was opposed by a few editors who "oppose all" mention of coronavirus in the lead -- an absurd position -- and one editor who denies WP:NPOV. There's no point in the editors who contributed to the valid consensus text repeating their views here. What's needed is either collaboration (presenting RS to support their view) or a stick-drop from those who deny coronavirus belongs in the lead or would like to chronicle Trump's successes in the matter. SPECIFICO talk 23:50, 20 July 2020 (UTC)

That is exactly correct. Here is the tally from the discussion above:

• 17 Supporting: MelanieN, Scjessey, 0x004d, 2600:1702:2340:9470:*, starship.paint, Harsh, Neutrality, OhKayeSierra, 107.217.84.95, Aquillion, SPECIFICO, Snooganssnoogans, Space4Time3Continuum2x, MrX, FeldBum, Calidum, and Mgasparin. (Most made valid arguments or invoked valid arguments of others)
• 12 Opposing: MONGO, Markbassett, JFG, Rusf10, Basil the Bat Lord, Atsme, Amakuru, Kind Tennis Fan, Mr Ernie, PackMecEng, 121.99.126.230, and MaleRooster. (Some made non-policy-based arguments; several declined to respond to questions challenging their arguments.) - MrX 🖋 13:34, 21 July 2020 (UTC), Corrected miscount. - MrX 🖋 18:33, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

• I suggest something along the lines of

  After the WHO announced the COVID19 outbreak in China on January 30, the Trump administration issued a partial travel on February 2nd. Trump was slow to address the issues of shortages of personal protective equipment so Democrats urged Trump to invoke the Defense Production Act. Trump supported the bipartisan CARES Act to boost unemployment income for those laid off by the pandemic and to provide relief to businesses. Trump was criticized for a slow response, misleading the public on the availability of testing and treatments and downplaying the severity of the crisis. Polls indicate more than 60% of the electorate believe Trump has been mishandling the pandemic.

  So K, J-1, L-2, A, E, B.--MONGO (talk) 02:56, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

  Except that the article cites RS that say Trump was warned in early January and did nothing. SPECIFICO talk 03:02, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

  Far too long for mention of a single issue of a highly controversial presidency in the lead of an article that is not specifically about his presidency. Even if he loses re-election and this issue gets the blame for that in RS, we would say in this lead only that, not give details about the issue. It remains to be seen whether the issue will attain that extreme level of importance, approaching Watergate and Monicagate. ―Mandruss ☎ 10:01, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

  The last line could be removed and it would only be 4 lines. We have 3 dedicated to discussions about his falsehoods. It may be a single issue, but it certainly is the most significant issue of his presidency...and the section it supports is 10 paragraphs of the body.--MONGO (talk) 16:25, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

User:MONGO not that I'm saying ay or nay for it, but will offer remarks on wording back. For "partial travel on February 2nd" is that "partial travel ban" and the word "issued" would be 30 January, or maybe just 'began travel restrictions by February 2'. The second line seems a subset of the theme in the fourth line. And the fifth line seems unclear - polls are a moving target and not sure what poll was or what was asked. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:03, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

• Support A, B, C, D, E, F, G, I-2, N per my earlier comments about WP:DUEWEIGHT evidenced by extensive, persistent coverage in reliable sources. Oppose I-1, K, L-1, L-2 - Strong oppose M per WP:OR - MrX 🖋 13:03, 21 July 2020 (UTC), 13:17, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

I want to also point out that the following nine editors have previously chosen options A, B, C, D, and E by choosing option 3 in the discussion above: Neutrality, MrX, Scjessey, starship.paint, Harsh, Aquillion, Snooganssnoogans, Calidum, and Mgasparin. I mention this because their previous choices are still valid unless they change them here. - MrX 🖋 13:17, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• A thru G and I-2. I guess? This is a weirdly-formatted survey, and I pray for the admin who comes to close it. ValarianB (talk) 13:21, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• I want a beautifully formatted table of green and red squares by the closer. Snooganssnoogans (talk) 18:08, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• I was going to abstain from this particular section because I thought it was over complicated and wouldn't go anywhere, but it seems I was wrong. Now that MrX has invoked my username and presented my view implicitly, I think I have no choice but to weigh in with specifics. Mindful that this concerns the lead, and must necessarily be concise, I am obliged to make the following choices:

• Strong support of A, B, C, D, E, F, and G.
• Support of I-2.
• Neutral on H (probably not the space for it).
• Weak oppose of L-2 because of space.
• Oppose all others for various reasons including WP:WEIGHT for some and WP:OR for some.

-- Scjessey (talk) 13:47, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• Comment Wouldn't I-2 as added by @Neutrality: better reflect the sources and significance of the premature reopening posture if the text states that the result was a resurgeance, acceleration, and geographic spread of the virus? Pining those who endorsed options I and I-2 @Scjessey, ValarianB, MrX, and Snooganssnoogans: I will add this as I-2a SPECIFICO talk 18:01, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• The tilting back up of the curve is almost certainly the result of premature opening, and I'm sure sources will support that, but I'm not sure it is the kind of thing we need to put in the lead. Better in the body of the article, methinks. -- Scjessey (talk) 18:06, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• My thinking was that w/o context, "early" will seem subjective or uncalibrated. We got quite a bit of criticism and discussion about "slow" that may relate to the same issue. SPECIFICO talk 18:16, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

• Also, in general I think the formalities without results are meaningless. Trump appears to favor announcing what sound like bold measures: Travel Ban (a sieve) Wartime Powers (to no effect per CNN) Purchase millions of doses of Hydroxychloroquine (scientific trials found no effect) Withdraw from WHO (one year lag, if it ever happens). Even if these had been significant, they are the kind of policy (or false policy) measures that would go in the Presidency or other articles. On a personal biographical level, the noteworthy factors are his disengagement from the crisis, empty promises, and obstruction of best practices epidemiological policy. These personal actions and choices are suitable for this article. I would omit all the inconsequential or tangential actions, including signing a veto-proof relief bill, passively watching Congress and the Fed do the rescue of the American economy. These are highly personal choices. Not many leaders have acted that way. SPECIFICO talk 19:33, 21 July 2020 (UTC)

I kind of agree with Scjessey here. The re-opening and the rapid escalation were partially, maybe even mostly, Trump's doing, but it was also because of governors (especially in the south); young people ignoring social distancing; businesses and local governments failing to take adequate measures, or rolling back measures (e.g. airlines), and so on. I think this is too complex to properly summarize in the lead. The phrase "... and and other activities" is a bit vague. - MrX 🖋 00:55, 22 July 2020 (UTC)

• Support A-G A-F and I-2a and Oppose H, I-1, I-2, J-1, K-N, P for the table of @MrX: SPECIFICO talk 18:31, 23 July 2020 (UTC) WHO thing is mid-2021. Unlikely. SPECIFICO talk 20:06, 30 July 2020 (UTC)
• This table does look like a cool visualization. Please see my votes below. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Strong Support F, G, I-1 Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Support K Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Weak Support I-2, L-2, P Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Neutral A, B, C, H, L-1, M (would change vote if I knew what was being attributed), O Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Weak Oppose D, I-2a Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose J-1 Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose E, J-2, N Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 18:46, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
• Strong Oppose all - call an RfC, propose a succinct paragraph in compliance with NPOV (which I thought we already did), and get wider community input. Is it possible there may be a mistaken belief that the US government is in full control of the country's healthcare in a crisis, over and above the enumerated powers of POTUS? If you believe it does, read this to better understand that state governments actually possess more power than the federal government in responding to a health crisis. The US does not have the same health care system as other countries in the world, including Canada, the UK, Mexico and most of Europe per List of countries with universal health care. ^Atsme _Talk 📧 21:48, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

We're trying to refine the wording. Repeating your !vote from the section above does not aid that process. - MrX 🖋 19:44, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

• This really should be done by way of an article Rfc to bring in fresh eyes, otherwise we have less than a dozen people so far chiming in on a critical issue in the lead of one of our most visited pages.--MONGO (talk) 18:59, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Maybe the 15 of the 20 current proposals with the most votes could be presented in the RfC? Or perhaps something like those with a score of great than -2 or even 0? Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 19:07, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

That's nonsense. We are not sentencing a woman to death here. It is just a summary of established article content. An RfC adding drive-by opinions of editors not familiar with previous article and lead discussions would only prevent ongoing incremental improvement. SPECIFICO talk 19:21, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

There are many potential summaries of the established article content, and you keep implying that your preference is the only one that makes sense. Alternatively, you keep implying that your preference already has consensus, but when challenged you fail to produce persuasive evidence of same. Apparently you just want us to take your word for things and recognize your superior judgment in these things. This persistent behavior is not constructive behavior. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:41, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

I imply nothing. Take a deep breath. Thx. SPECIFICO talk 21:54, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

I took a deep breath and I stand by my previous comment. Thx. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:59, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose all (seems the consensus) - while there were variations in the opposition, the prior discussion of this thread seemed the proposals 1 2 3 had a consensus of 'oppose' and phrasing of 'oppose all' was commonly said as each one was mostly opposed by folks rather than anything having a consensus. The A B C ... through P are topics and if you're asking are they contentious then I'd have to say it depends on the phrasing and the context. A topic of "slow" is different depending on if the proposed phrase is "initially slow" or "criticized as slow" or "falsely said slow"; and if the context is for a LEAD edit or a body edit, and whether the sole part of the paragraph of has more there. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 17:51, 29 July 2020 (UTC) (edit conflict) If you're asking if each is notable enough for the lead then I'll have to say that 'notable' is not an acceptable basis for lead position so oppose all. The basis could be a WP:LEAD summary of body content or a match for WP:DUE prominence by coverage WEIGHT, no other basis would do. Markbassett (talk) 18:42, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

@Markbassett:

Please don't add "Oppose all" across the board to this chart. We already have the 12 oppose all !votes tallied above. The purpose of this list is to determine specific wording preferred by editors who support something in the lead. - MrX 🖋 19:39, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

So either delete the comment or change it, please. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:56, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Scjessey - Oppose all (seems the consensus) - factually is part of my input. Yes 'none of the above' isn't desired, but that doesn't mean 'none of the above' isn't part of my input - and the above snippet of MrX is a different flavor of intent that seems simply incorrect since this thread isn't yet looking at the "determine specific wording", which was part of why I'm at Oppose all. Where the thread was looking for some sense of what's more or less contentious -- I have explained that depends on the phrasing and position -- and where the ending question of which is "notable enough for Lead" -- I give oppose all because that's not a valid basis for Lead content. While I could try to give some ranking as to what seems body larger or WEIGHT more prominent -- even that wraps into it depends on phrasing and position and would still leave all these selections as 'oppose' for content and conflict reasons. My responses would be 'not X: blah bla bla, it should ask bla beeh bla'.

Although the phrasing topic is not the question asked, that seemed to me an important sidenote to mention and it seems evidenced at F/G and I, J, and L. I also see A as conflicting with or competing with M because of the wording, both being some prominence to a sub-area of criticism and how it's phrased. So !vote is oppose all, but this was somewhat good for eliciting more concerns. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 19:42, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

• With the caveat that I'm not a big fan of the way this was presented (we need to get better at shutting down launches of major discussions that haven't been sufficiently workshopped; it's almost impossible to abort anything other than the most clear-cut cases, and anyone with ideas on making it easier should go to WP:VPI), here are my views: Support A, B, C, D, E, G, I-2 or I-2a, and L-2 as reasonable due coverage of the defining crisis of Trump's presidency. For L-2, I'd suggest the phrasing Signed a multi-trillion dollar stimulus passed by Congress. Strategically !voting weak support for F, K, N, and P, since these are all true facts, and while I'd personally leave those out for WP:WEIGHT reasons, I think it's essential to get something in the lead at this point so I'm not willing to risk scuttling things by !voting neutral. I object somewhat to N on the grounds that if we're looking to gauge severity, the per capita count is more appropriate. Oppose H, I-1, J-1/J-2, and O, and strongly oppose M. For H: Unless there's news I'm not caught up on (in which case feel free to give me links), Trump's efforts to repeal Obamacare are nothing but lip service at this point. For I-1: it's not really accurate to say he focused on the economic impact, when the main thing driving the economic downturn right now is the prevalence of the virus; the qualifier "tried" would be needed. For J: undue, since Trump hasn't made sufficient use of the act and since it's not notable as the bare expected minimum response. For M: it's unclear which things this would apply to, which makes it a bad addition, but in any case, plenty of these things are facts that shouldn't be attributed as opinions per WP:NPOV's avoid stating facts as opinions, and anything that's merely an opinion doesn't belong in the lead. For O: undue. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 18:10, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

• Chiming in a little late: I absolutely think we need something about the coronavirus in the lead; it’s disgraceful that we aren’t mentioning what will probably turn out to be the most memorable thing about his presidency. I think we can only have a sentence in the lead, or at most two, and it should only include things that are described in some detail and well sourced in the article text. I would include A, B, C, D, E, K, and P. Basically I propose a version of Version 2 from the earlier discussion: Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic; he issued partial travel bans for China and Europe, but otherwise minimized the threat and shifted responsibility for combating the virus to the individual states. He ignored or contradicted many health recommendations from officials in his administration and passed false information to the public about unproven treatments and the availability of testing. -- MelanieN (talk) 21:39, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

  Update: After looking at MrX’s chart below (thank you, User:MrX, brilliantly done!) it looks like solid support for A through G and nothing else. Personally I wouldn’t have included F (the “blamed” sentence) as it is less emphasized in the article text that other issues, but seeing A through G as an apparent consensus, I would support a sentence along those lines. Looking at my proposed version above, I would change it to leave out K and P, and instead include F and G. New proposal: Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic; he minimized the threat, ignored or contradicted many health recommendations from officials in his administration, and passed false information to the public about unproven treatments and the availability of testing. He blamed the pandemic on China as well as Democratic state governors, the previous administration, and the media, and he took steps to withdraw the United States from the World Health Organization. Note that I reworded the “blamed” section slightly, to reflect what the article text says. -- MelanieN (talk) 21:59, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Support B, C, D, F, G, I-1, I-2, I-2a J-1, Neutral A (Some RS do say it, but there is disagreement on the subject, his travel ban was pretty quick.) M (While attribution can't hurt, I just don't think it's necessary, at least for the phrases I supported), P (I think that is fairly vague, not concrete enough to unequivocally put in the lead.) Oppose E (I just don't think it has gotten enough coverage to have due weight for inclusion in the lede.) GH (Simply not DUE, and of only peripheral relevance to his policy on the pandemic) J-2 (He did invoke it, later then he should have but he nonetheless did) L-1, L-2 (Sure he signed it, but congress was the one that did everything, Trump did nothing else but sign it) N, O (It's not a concrete example of anything Trump has done, and something many would say is not even a result of anything Trump has done) Strong Support K (This is the one thing that Trump actually did to promptly. If we are going to have any due weight in this section, we have to include the one thing that Trump actually did right.) Zoozaz1 (talk) 18:47, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

@Zoozaz1: You indicated both support and opposition for option G. Would you please clarify? - MrX 🖋 19:10, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, that was a typo. It gets a bit confusing with the large amount of options. I meant H. Zoozaz1 (talk) 20:03, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Unofficial !vote tally

Here is my attempt at a visual representation of the !votes in this discussion. Feel free to edit the original to add new !votes, or if I've made any errors. I would ask that you consult before making major changes to the formatting. - MrX 🖋 18:27, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Thanks. Very helpful, and obviously no trivial task. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:41, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Seems to ratify the consensus text initially crafted by MrX, possibly with some pointers for additions and tweaks. SPECIFICO talk 18:43, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Please don't add "Oppose all" across the board to this chart. We already have the 12 oppose all !votes tallied above. The purpose of this list is to determine specific wording preferred by editors who support something in the lead. - MrX 🖋 19:39, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

Seems short -- I'm thinking the approach overplayed, not sure you should try this approach ... but will offer a note on completeness for possible help. This seems missing input by RusF near 2600 and my and Sdkb recent remarks immediately above, and mention for views of Harsh, Aquillion, Calidum, and Mgasparin. The list of 10 also seems less than the 29 prior participants (from "17+12" remark). Perhaps view this as a powerpoint (caveat implied) to show this subthread so far but not all of the thread views? Or that this is a sidethread for a feeling of who approves where in the A through P ? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 20:26, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Perhaps a fresh voice might help with this endless discussion. I've looked over the above and am thoroughly confused as to the text proposed for the lead. It strikes me that including all of the options that have the most support (c.f., table) would give a paragraph that may be too long for the lead. A suggestion for a concrete way forward? Start a fresh discussion (close this one; any new editor would likely have no idea how things stand). In the new discussion, have contributors develop 3-4 text proposals for the lead, perhaps in a table - have three people write 3 suggested texts based on this discussion, then let those texts get polished by others (sandbox style; pick the one you like best, fix the bits you don't like) for a few days or a week. Then take a new vote/assessment of the 3-4 developed texts. (I am in general in favor of text outline such as: "Trump denied, was slow, obfuscated, misinformed, then led the country to early reopening, leading to a resurgence of the pandemic by June 2020." This sort of endless process is why I (try to) shy away from political articles like this.) Bdushaw (talk) 21:00, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Incidentally, as you all know, the lead should reflect the content of the article. But the covid section of the article may (should) undergo considerable revision. It makes sense to me that the U.S. federal government response to the COVID-19 pandemic is the Main article, while this article should employ condensed text from that article. The point being that text for the lead may be aiming at a moving target - it might make more sense to revise/condense the covid section first, then draw on what develops for some good lead sentences. (And I think that Trump urged an early reopening, with several states following that dangerous lead is an important fact.) Bdushaw (talk) 22:11, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

Bdushaw - welcome, and I agree at least that this should respawn/refocus as it's own thread -- we've gotten a long way from the original topic of whether to mention Obamacare in lead or to say it as 'Affordable Care Act'. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 22:53, 29 July 2020 (UTC)

You have to read the entire level 2 section to understand what's going on. Version 3 proposed by Neutrality (scroll up), plus the WHO withdrawal, has obtained the most support. Notwithstanding the 11 opposes and 1 partial oppose, this version, or a close variant, has the greatest amount of support. There is no benefit from starting the process over for what would be the third time for this discussion, and at least the fifth time for this material in general. Contrary to your apparent assumption, the goal of this, or any discussion is not to make it easy for new users to understand what's going on. In my view, new users should edit in non-controversial article space; learn our policies and guidelines; and gain experience with the dispute resolution process before jumping into one of the most controversial, high-traffic articles on Wikipedia. - MrX 🖋 12:02, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

I didn't say start over, I said make a clean summary so that others can see what is going on. I've been a new user since 2005, I've made valuable, constructive, non-combative (until now...) contributions to this article, your views on Wikipedia and new users are contrary to Wikipedia, and you, MrX, should know better. Bdushaw (talk) 12:50, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Then why did you mention it? If you can't unravel the discussion that's not something that someone else has to solve. Most everyone else seems to understand what the options are. To recap: The original post proposed specific, clear wording. Neutrality proposed an alteration to that (version 3; also crystal clear) which was supported by several editors. Other editors blanket-opposed everything and then disappeared from the discussion. starship.paint listed extensive evidence supporting option 3 (as well as 1 and 2). Then, Awilley attempted to break it down so that we could vote on specific elements. I neatly summarized that in a table. The clean summary is at the top of each subsection, and only gets confusing when editors complain about process, ramble incoherently, and make repetitive arguments. - MrX 🖋 17:39, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Bdushaw - For what help it may be, I think the “version 3” refers to the first subthread of “We have to agree and specify wording”. The top thread “Covid-19 in the lead” was originally about whether to mention “Obamacare” or to use “Affordable Care Act” and had a few variants of one proposal, then came a “We have to agree” section with 5 variants of a different proposal. That whole “We have to” section had mostly objections, and unusually said “all” in many “Oppose all” feedbacks. Version 3 was already and emphatically rejected. This part is maybe getting some info for what bits the supporters felt most positive towards. Covid has substantial articles and is at Presidency of Donald Trump - and it has a section here in his biographical article, but Lead position was decided against. In the last rfc, (and this one seems headed the same way) noted at the top of this thread:

This RfC doesn't reach a consensus about whether to mention coronavirus in the lead of Trump's article. It also doesn't reach a consensus about what to say if we did mention it.

Cheers Markbassett (talk) 04:12, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

The additions / reverts by MrX and SPECIFICO go against the current consensus list #45. I haven't seen anywhere the new consensus nor the agreed upon wording. Mr Ernie (talk) 14:16, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

While I personally agree with the opinion expressed in this edit, I find it outrageous that it is being stated in Wikivoice. Something is seriously wrong if anyone believes that that's what WP:NPOV looks like. -Thucydides411 (talk) 14:43, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

I certainly wouldn't say whether I agree or disagree with the opinion expressed, it shouldn't matter, I would agree that it shouldn't be a Wiki voice. I removed the section again since a clear consensus should be established before an inclusion. I do think SOMETHING belongs in the lead, but we haven't found agreement YET. --Malerooster (talk) 15:12, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

I've reread the Covid19 section of this article - I find the text in question (added/removed/reverted/etc) to be a succinct summary of that section; more than a few things are missing (undermining health insurance, withdraw from WHO to cover false allegations against it, face masks, confusion and contradiction, etc), but brevity is a constraint. These bare facts, readily stated in the article, stacked together look bad in wikivoice...but those are the facts of the situation. The actions stated are not single incidences, but repeated, sustained actions by Trump. What NPOV statement could be devised that reflects these facts in NPOV voice? Perhaps the addition of something positive Trump did to combat the virus? (truthfully, don't know what that would be). We need the/some specific organized text options to work from, IMO. I found myself looking at Adolf Hitler to see how that article handled horrible stuff in wikivoice. The discussion here has become endless...something else is needed to break the logjam. Bdushaw (talk) 15:49, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

User:Bdushaw - obviously lesser items don’t get into body of his biography, much less the lead. NPOV is balance for the same negative item so it would be about the same item as the criticism. NPOV isn’t in having an equal number of positive and negative items. As for positives — well those are easily findable. Obvious ones would include being fast with travel restrictions, and fast plus substantial financial stimulus; supporting speedy development for a broad and diverse range of treatments and vaccines. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 05:48, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

@Thucydides411 - I'm sorry for your outrage, but you should direct it at the numerous sources that have explicitly stated these facts. - MrX 🖋 17:39, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

@Malerooster - You have misread consensus, or possibly confused it with unanimous agreement.- MrX 🖋 17:39, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

@Thucydides411, Malerooster, Bdushaw, and MrX: if the appropriate sources were provided here, derived from places like Nature and Science, the Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine, what if the text that MrX inserted were attributed to medical and public health scientists? I think those sources are available. -Darouet (talk) 17:32, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Let's please stay focused. starship.paint has listed numerous sources. I hope you took the time to read them. We don't typically consult medical journals when reporting the political and governing actions of the president. Why would we? Trump was slow to react and lied are not a WP:MEDRS-relevant claims. - MrX 🖋 17:44, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

And we don't attribute to a source when there is broad agreement among RS so as to imply false equivalencies. That's how Trump got in trouble with the astral sex doctor #Dreamin'ofaDemon. SPECIFICO talk 19:06, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

What's the false equivalence implied by my suggestion? -Darouet (talk) 04:15, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

Folks - you are perhaps having fun in that echo chamber, but it might work out better to address the concerns of other views or to at least acknowledge and show hearing in ways that aren’t dismissive and shows restraint about calling them deplorables. FWIW - is there anything of a purely factual and/or neutral content that you think could actually get widespread support now? Cheers Markbassett (talk) 04:41, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

@Darouet: - if you think sources like Nature and Science, the Lancet and the New England Journal of Medicine are available and commenting on this exact topic, that's great! Bring them to the table :) starship.paint (talk) 14:43, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

Those journals are in fact covering the topic. For instance:

• Piller C (March 26, 2020). "'This is insane!' Many scientists lament Trump's embrace of risky malaria drugs for coronavirus". Science. doi:10.1126/science.abb9021. Title speaks for itself; discusses Trump's promotion of medical misinformation and dubious "cures".
• Maxmen A, Tollefson J (2020). "Two decades of pandemic war games failed to account for Donald Trump". Nature. 584 (7819): 26–29. doi:10.1038/d41586-020-02277-6. PMID 32753759. Reviews the ways in which "war-gaming" efforts to prepare for a pandemic failed to account for a President who actively sabotages his own public-health experts; notes that it was well-known before this pandemic that travel bans are ineffective and that testing capacity and PPE stockpiles are key.
• Garrett L (2020). "COVID-19: the medium is the message". Lancet. 395 (10228): 942–943. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30600-0. PMID 32171075. ... had the Trump administration not declared criticism of its slow response to the encroaching epidemic a 'hoax', claiming it was a political attack from the left, the US CDC might have been pressured to do widespread testing in early February, discovering pockets of community transmission before they dispersed widely.
• Devi S (2020). "US public health budget cuts in the face of COVID-19". Lancet Infect Dis. 20 (4): 415. doi:10.1016/S1473-3099(20)30182-1. PMID 32222208. Discusses the ways in which Trump's budget cuts have weakened the US's ability to respond to the pandemic. Describes "concern over Trump’s appointment of Mike Pence, his vice-president, to lead the response because of his antiscientific views", citing the fact that Pence was claiming as late as 2000 that smoking was harmless and did not cause cancer.
• Limaye RJ, Sauer M, Ali J, Bernstein J, Wahl B, Barnhill A, Labrique A (2020). "Building trust while influencing online COVID-19 content in the social media world". Lancet Digit Health. 6 (2): e277. doi:10.1016/S2589-7500(20)30084-4. PMID 32322814. Discusses the spread of misinformation, specifically citing "the Trump administration referring to the epidemic as a hoax and political attack by opposition politicians. Misinformation can have fatal consequences, as shown by the spread of premature evidence suggesting chloroquine is an effective treatment for COVID-19."
• Waldman S (April 15, 2020). "U.S. conservatives who detest climate models add a new target: coronavirus models". Science. doi:10.1126/science.abc2693. Draws a direct line between Republican politicians' efforts to undermine epidemiological modeling of Covid-19 and their decades-long efforts to sabotage climate science.

Note that this is only a small sample. Of course, WP:MEDRS sources aren't necessary to support the facts that Trump's response to the pandemic has been slow, chaotic, and marked by the promulgation of misinformation and the undermining of legitimate public-health authorities, but they do exist. Looking through this discussion, I get the sense that the objections have very little to do with the volume and quality of sourcing (which is undeniably extensive), and more to do with resistance on the part of some editors to conveying well-sourced but unpalatable truths. MastCell ^Talk 23:46, 5 August 2020 (UTC)

@MastCell: :::waves::: It's been a while! -- Scjessey (talk) 14:47, 6 August 2020 (UTC)

Summary/Recap

At the risk of incurring the wrath of...everyone... I attempt to write a summary or recap of the above discussion. Be bold, they say.

With pointers from the ever-encouraging MrX, the above lengthy dialog does make sense. The question was what key phrases would comprise an addition to the lead. User Awilley, carefully examined the content of the Covid19 section of the article and broke down the key elements as options A-P. That is important, since the lead must reflect the content of the article. Starship.paint provided an extensive summary/survey of the reliable sources that supported each of those key elements. The table by MrX then summarized the user support from editors for each possible contribution to the lead. This process is thorough, clinical and objective (hence intimidatingly lengthy). From the table, indicating elements that had the most support, the options for text for the lead were evaluated Version 1-3. Of these, Version 3 had the greatest support, recently leading to the minor revert battle when it was attempted to be added to the lead.

Version 3: Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic; he minimized the threat, ignored or contradicted many health recommendations from officials in his administration, and passed false information to the public about unproven treatments and the availability of testing.

I copy edited this text to

Version 3a: Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic. He minimized its threat, ignored or contradicted many recommendations from health officials, and promoted false information about unproven treatments and the availability of testing.

which seemed to me to be better English and seems to have been supported.

The facts of each of the phrases of this entry are not in dispute. Put together this way, however, they provoked a negative response: not in wikivoice, not NPOV, etc.

Those that object to the statement or wish to improve it have an obligation to suggest appropriate text, drawn from the Covid19 section, and/or develop the Covid19 section to better reflect their views as to appropriate facts or tone; supported by reliable sources as always. Option K, the immigration response, has been mentioned as one of Trump's positive contributions, but this option received little support.

A key, basic question, apparently still unanswered, is whether the Covid19 response is to be mentioned at all in the lead.

Sticking strictly to Wikipedia policies and respectful of the above discussion, what can be added or changed to the proposed Version 3 text that would result in a consensus for an addition to the lead? Bdushaw (talk) 13:26, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

I note that per the discussion below, the article U.S. federal government response to the COVID-19 pandemic is available as a resource. I view it as a sister article to this one. Bdushaw (talk) 13:53, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

It has been noted that I misrepresented the chronology of the Versions and the subsequent discussion. It was Versions first, work to determine a best phrasing 2nd. I recognized that midway through the above, but thought the process was the main point, chronology is neither here nor there in this case.Bdushaw (talk) 15:47, 31 July 2020 (UTC)

• User:Bdushaw a few facts off in that review, let me restate.

Awiley did some paraphrasing of bits for A-M from a casually said from prior TALK as well as article. That later expanded a bit and he later added P. It’s not a careful examination of article nor all from him.

Starship had previously done unrelated 5 sets of urls titled with kinds of “slow”, they were not part of the current A thru P items and only A is about “slow”.

MrX summarised only the minority of editors who wanted anything as to what bits they’d like. Those opposed were expressly disinvited and their inputs are not reflected.

The question of whether there is to be Covid in the lead is not unanswered. The answer in the consensus list is “no”.

Those who object have no “obligation to suggest appropriate text”, that is kind of the point. If anything, the BRD guidance is for the *proposer* to listen to the objections already given.

Cheers Markbassett (talk) 09:14, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Current Consensus #45: "There is no consensus to mention the COVID-19 pandemic in the lead section." It would be helpful if you could provide a brief summary of the arguments of those "opposed" (and what exactly they are opposed to), keeping in mind the present content of the Covid19 section of the article. Bdushaw (talk) 10:12, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Here is a version of Version 3a, annotated by supporting citations presently given in the article Covid19 section. (I don't advocate including these citations in the lead.):

Trump was slow to react to the COVID-19 pandemic.^[1][2] He minimized its threat,^[3][2][4] ignored or contradicted many recommendations from health officials, ^[3][2][5][6] and promoted false information about unproven treatments^{[7][8][9][10]} and the availability of testing.^{[11][2][5][8]}

I looked over the above discussion, and noted that, despite repeated requests, those opposed to inclusion of a Covid19 statement, or to aspects of facts discussed, provided a dearth of citations to support their views. It would be nice to see a collection of citations such as starship.paint provided, that would support a moderated version of Version 3. A principle objection was that the statements of Version 3 are absolute, whereas they should be couched in language as "Critics say..." or "Health officials say". I don't find that argument convincing - it isn't consistent with the absolute nature of the statements in the citations given, we are to avoid weasel words ("Critics" ??? Who?), and such language is not consistent with how the Covid19 section is written.Bdushaw (talk) 11:22, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

As a matter of discussion on principle, I noted that the lead presently states Many of his comments and actions have been characterized as racially charged or racist. rather than the more direct Many of his comments and actions have been racially charged or racist. I contemplate how the Version 3 statement may be reformulated in this sort of way...Trump's response to the pandemic has been characterized as slow... etc? ("characterized as" is still a weasel word approach...characterized by who?) Bdushaw (talk) 11:55, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

So here is an attempt: Version 3b Trump's reaction to the COVID-19 pandemic has been characterized as slow. He has been described as minimizing its threat, ignoring or contradicting many recommendations from health officials, and promoting false information about unproven treatments and the availability of testing. Bdushaw (talk) 12:12, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

User:Bdushaw Let me be clear: WP:ONUS is on the proposers here. Those who want some content in the lead maybe should try acknowledging concerns, seeking to address them, and acknowledging maybe that it actually doesn’t fit into his biography article. To just repeatedly try minor variations of #3 and to speak presumptively that oppose !votes cannot speak or must provide parts they would accept, and literally only count supporters just seems Denialism a.k.a WP:IDHT. There is no consensus to have anything, and there’s no onus to provide a cite about that since it was from two RFCs. Just tired of having to read yet another post talking about the weeks-ago rejected version 3 or repeating yet again the same cites, it seems WP:STICK. I’ll be happy to offer input for folks who want to address concerns and improve the article and consensus - but right now that is by saying to discuss and address the concerns. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 23:22, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Regardless of how you frame it, Mark, there's clearly significant support for A, B, C, D, E, F and G. I would say an overwhelming consensus, in fact. So that should be our starting point. As for "acknowledging concerns", the majority does not need to bend over backwards to accommodate the minority. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:36, 1 August 2020 (UTC)

Tsk. Well, I could use your phrasing and frame it there’s clearly significant opposition, and that clearly there is no consensus to include anything. I however can back that up with fact of a numbered consensus said that twice, and by this thread the revert and amount of oppose in the top with unusual amount of ‘oppose all’. So that should be your starting point. And that WP guidance the ONUS is on proposer, along with BRD to address the concerns. Instead there seems a persistent behaviour of presumptive declaration, denying or simply ignoring any other views even exist and overstating support. (This apparent announcing a count limited to non-opposition as a ‘consensus’ being a case in point.) Well, it’s an approach I don’t think improves content or leads to consensus, but for now I don’t see any willingness to address things so think it will remain at no consensus for anything. Cheers Markbassett (talk) 15:10, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

To add to the summary above, I note that, at least for the past few weeks, I believe the content of the Covid19 section of this article has been stable. I've just learned that there is also the article Trump administration communication during the COVID-19 pandemic of direct relation to this discussion. Bdushaw (talk) 05:30, 2 August 2020 (UTC)

There have been two previous discussions of this issue, now archived (link 1, link 2) The first was a formal RfC, the second has been called an RfC, and is closed as such, but it seems it was not actually a formal RfC. Both of these discussions could be characterized as still struggling to define the parameters of the issue. Bdushaw (talk) 06:43, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

I've been reviewing WP:LEAD. I provide here two quotes from that guidance of direct relevance to our present impass:

• Reliably sourced material about encyclopedically relevant controversies is neither suppressed in the lead nor allowed to overwhelm; the lead must correctly summarize the article as a whole.
• The lead must conform to verifiability, biographies of living persons, and other policies. The verifiability policy advises that material that is challenged or likely to be challenged, and direct quotations, should be supported by an inline citation. Any statements about living persons that are challenged or likely to be challenged must have an inline citation every time they are mentioned, including within the lead.

So (a) the lead requires a summary of the Covid-19 section, and (b) it appears it also requires extensive citations as well. Bdushaw (talk) 16:18, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

We don't have citations in the lead of this article. Since the lead is a summary of the body, and the body contains the citations, there is no need to repeat them in the lead. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:17, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

What Scjessey said, notwithstanding the MOS guideline you quoted. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:59, 3 August 2020 (UTC)

Of general, but related interest, today in the WA Post, "Covid-19 is one of Wikipedia’s biggest challenges ever. Here’s how the site is handling it." Bdushaw (talk) 16:41, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

Chiming in late to the discussion: I support version 3A as proposed by Bdushaw above, and I think it is time to put it in the lead. I would also support "has been characterized as", only if that is necessary to get agreement to put it in the article. @Bdushaw: Thanks for your dedicated, focused, and neutral work on this issue. -- MelanieN (talk) 18:38, 7 August 2020 (UTC)

• How to end this mess: Yikes, this discussion is still going on? We are utterly past past the point of further debate being useful, and it's also pretty clear that (intentionally or not, and to AGF I think it's largely unintentional) there is a status quo stonewalling dynamic where those opposed to mentioning the pandemic in the lead are using the lack of clear consensus around what specific text to add as a rationale for blocking the addition of anything at all. That deadlock is not going to get broken by another summary of a summary of the ten previous summaries, but only by a formal administrative close. I'm therefore listing this discussion at WP:ANRFC.^{Oh wait, it's already there. I'll try commenting to bump it instead.} Hopefully, the closer will be able to use the massive amount of prior discussion on this topic to assess a consensus for a specific wording that we can add to the article and the current consensus list. But even if not, they would at least be able to offer up a concise framing of the available options in a way that would allow for a truly conclusive RfC (probably advertised at WP:CENT), rather than one that constantly gets derailed every time someone wants to modify one of the proposals or reset the discussion and starts a new subsection reframing the options as a way to do that. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 20:20, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
• Comment to closer: this close should take into account that there is an RfC lower on the page which has virtually reached consensus on the language to include. -- MelanieN (talk) 20:36, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

  MelanieN, oh wow, I hadn't even noticed that yet. If this is take 69, I guess that's take 70. Whichever admin does a close here should close them all together. ((u|Sdkb)) ^talk 20:41, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

• Note to closer: The related RfC referenced by MelanieN has been archived. It can be found here: [61] - MrX 🖋 11:08, 29 August 2020 (UTC)