Coronavirus Criminals and Pandemic Profiteers: Accountability for Those Who Caused the Crisis - John Nichols

Published in 2022 by Verso, Brooklyn, NY and London, UK

336 pages

ISBN: 978-1-83976-377-9

Just over two years ago, I was working at a brewery when my co-workers and I heard of the first coronavirus death in Seattle. A few weeks later, my then-girlfriend and I discussed how we would handle the two-week quarantine that the nation seemed to be going under in order to “stop the spread.” No one at the time predicted that the pandemic would even last into the summer, let alone two entire years. Since the beginning of the COVID pandemic, we’ve faced lockdowns, political divisions over masks and social distancing, and (most importantly and tragically) the loss of hundreds of thousands of Americans. As of May 2022, more than one million Americans have died of COVID-19, roughly 16% of the 6.15 million people who have died of the disease worldwide (a statistic particularly striking since the US contains just 4% of the total world population). 

To say that the previous administration’s response to the pandemic was inadequate is an understatement. For those on the frontlines of the pandemic serving as “essential workers,” the past two years have been one of unprecedented anxiety, grief, and loneliness. Most of us didn’t have a choice when it came to facing the risk of being around others during the pandemic: it was either work or starve. For the political elite and exorbitantly wealthy, however, this crisis has been a time of unprecedented growth and profit. While most Americans struggled to pay rent, grocery bills, healthcare costs, and other extraneous expenses, the top fifteen wealthiest Americans saw their fortunes rise by more than 1.8 trillion dollars. As just one example, during the past two years, “Elon Musk has seen his wealth increase by an eye-popping $150 billion during the pandemic, a gain of over 600 percent.” 

Politicians fumbled in their public response to the pandemic while lining their pockets, often impeding preventative measures such as contact tracing and social distancing while casting doubt on the efficacy of masks and vaccines. On the other hand, billionaires and pharmaceutical companies saw their stock prices rise as they turned a crisis into a profitable opportunity. In his 2022 book, Coronavirus Criminals and Pandemic Profiteers, journalist and author John Nichols provides a scathing indictment of those responsible for the crisis and calls for them to be held accountable for their actions. 

Overview: 

Over the past two years, we have been exposed to so much news about COVID-19 and its deadly impact. The headlines have been filled with rising cases and incomprehensible death tolls. Most of us are COVID weary, and as our knowledge of the virus grows and it continually mutates into new variants, it can be mentally taxing to keep up with it all. Nichols believes that the one thing we cannot lose, however, is our anger and rage toward those whose incompetence and greed stoked the flames of death and disaster. 

Through recounting a staggering laundry list of the various misdeeds of American leaders, Nichols argues that these individuals and corporations need to be held accountable for the hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths that have occurred during the duration of this pandemic. Nichols argues that their ineptitude, avarice, and refusal to provide leadership in this time are damning and worthy of prosecution. While recognizing that it is an incomplete list, Nichols targets eighteen individuals who he believes caused the most damage during the pandemic. 

As most people could probably guess, Nichols first zeroes in on the Trump administration, including Donald Trump himself, Mike Pence, Jared Kushner, Mike Pompeo, Mark Meadows, Betsy DeVos, and Elaine Chao. Of course, most of us know that Donald Trump refused to publicly recognize the seriousness of the virus, even if he admitted it in private conversations. Even before the pandemic, Mike Pence had a track record regarding the 2015 HIV outbreak during his tenure as governor of Indiana. Mike Pompeo, relying on outdated nationalistic impulses, pressured other countries to not accept aid from former rival nations like Cuba. Betsy Devos used her position within the administration to bolster the privatization of education, while Elaine Chao stubbornly refused to utilize her position as the Secretary of Transportation to implement effective safety measures. Instead, she chose to promote her family’s shipping business during her time in office, once again putting profits over people. Her husband, Mitch McConnell, likewise used his position as Senate Majority Leader to block the Heroes Act unless it included a liability shield to protect his donors and large corporations. As we see, while many Americans died due to the incompetence of our leaders, many more also suffered dearly due to our leaders’ choices to put their electoral ambitions and financial interests above the health and safety of the American people. 

In the global pandemic that COVID-19 wrought, there was a lot of blame to go around for how ineptly our leaders responded to the virus. While even most liberals would agree that Donald Trump and his cabinet share a fair share of the blame, Nichols is not content to simply call out the Republicans within the Trump administration. Rather, Nichols also rebukes several Democrats, including Andrew Cuomo, whose response led to numerous deaths in New York nursing homes and who (like McConnell) lobbied for liability shields for companies so that they could not be sued over mishandling their workers’ health. He also castigates Democrat Rahm Emmanuel and his neoliberal trade policies, which offshored manufacturing and created logistical hurdles that delayed the supply of adequate PPE and other medical supplies when it was critically needed. Additionally, Nichols casts his ire toward the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, which sought to maximize its profits while exploiting poorer nations who struggled to pay for enough doses of the vaccine. 

After detailing the 18 individuals and corporations who are most responsible for the crisis, Nichols issues a call to action: we need to hold these responsible parties accountable so that nothing like this can happen again. Nichols references the work of Ferdinand Pecora, a New York prosecutor who was hired by the Senate Committee in 1932 to investigate the causes of the Great Depression and the Stock Market Crash of 1929. In the process of his investigation, Pecora uncovered a litany of criminal financial dealings and political corruption, which he used to hold those on Wall Street accountable and led to Congress passing the Glass-Steagall Act. Similarly, Nichols believes that those responsible for the coronavirus crisis should firstly be “named and shamed,” and then be held fully accountable for their (in)actions. 

Commendations:

One of the most important and impactful parts of Nichols’ book is that it continually highlights the plight of workers. While the majority of the book is largely a list of bad actors, Nichols also makes sure to keep referring back to the stories of average American workers who suffered tremendous losses during this crisis. He points out the power differential between the average frontline worker and their employers who prioritized personal profit over their worker’s health and safety. As someone who was working in the food service industry at the beginning of this crisis, this point particularly hit home. 

Nichols is unflinching in his insistence that these individuals must be judged and held accountable for their actions. Nichols is acerbic and biting in his critique, which, while on one hand alienating most readers who don’t agree with his moral pronouncements, on the other hand, makes for a quite entertaining read. While Nichols reiterates the culpability of largely-known public figures such as Trump, Pence, Kushner, DeSantis, and Bezos, he also shrewdly shines a light on less well-known figures, such as Wisconsin Supreme court Justice Rebecca Bradley or conservative political activist Grover Norquist.

Beyond just describing the actions of these individuals and the crisis they exacerbated, Nichols hopes that this book will help shape the narrative of the pandemic by calling for these figures to face the consequences of their actions. While moderates might contend that we need to pursue reconciliation to “heal the divide” in our nation, Nichols shreds this notion apart by insisting that this only serves the interests of a minority of elites that continue to exploit the common worker to maximize their political projects and economic profits. Such a nation that allows such egregious acts to go unanswered can by no means be called democratic, and while Nichols realizes that change is unlikely, he still makes a compelling case to keep these individuals accountable. 

Furthermore, Nichols rightly points out that this crisis is not simply the result of the bad choices of individuals. Rather, the neoliberal policies that have been enacted over the past several decades ago have played a key role in worsening the crisis. While there are certainly more Republicans than Democrats on his list, Nichols emphasizes how both parties have long embraced neoliberal policies which strip protections from workers and weaken moderating, collective institutions. Trump and his associates are the symptoms of the wider rot within the American neoliberal capitalist system, which enjoys bipartisan political support. While Nichols’s political bias is certainly clear, he does a commendable job in keeping the larger trend of the neo-liberalization of the political spectrum and the damage it has caused at the forefront of his narrative. 

Critique: 

On the other hand, Coronavirus Criminals and Pandemic Profiteers suffers from its brisk pace and overly-acerbic tone. In his attempts to cover a wide array of individuals and their misdeeds, Nichols’ writing ends up consisting of mostly collections of quotations from various news sources with very little analysis or commentary. If you, like me, have been following the news closely during the past two years of the pandemic, then there is likely very little here that will be revelatory or new. Much of what Nichols describes in this book has been endlessly written about in various other media outlets. As such, while the chapters are concise and punchy, they lack a real sense of depth. The short and individualized format of the chapters also leads the text to become quickly repetitive when trying to read through large sections. As Nichols rants about the terrible actions of politicians and business leaders, the reader would be much better served by simply leading a chapter or two at a time, which staves off much of the overly-redundant nature of the work. 

In addition, while Nichols is justifiably angry at the individuals who exacerbated a crisis that has led to hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths, his vitriolic language is unlikely to appeal to or persuade anyone who doesn’t already agree with him or is already incensed. While I largely agree with much of Nichols’ assessment, I even found myself rolling my eyes at some of the hyper-partisan language that Nichols employs, often sounding more like pithy soundbites from MSNBC or CNN than actual analysis. Again, while I largely agree with Nichols in his fury at these political actors, I can hear conservatives arguing: “What about Fauci, the CDC, or China? Don’t they also have responsibility for this mess?” I fully recognize that this is a critique based almost entirely on aesthetics, and I am by no means arguing that Leftists must concede to far-right reactionaries to potentially win them over. But when Nichols is arguing for accountability that can only come through a popular mass movement, it is unfortunate that very few people outside of his political camp are likely to heed his call. 

The book ultimately serves as a collection of facts, which while immense, ultimately serves as a large and repetitive “fact-check.” By doing so, Nichols’ analysis implicitly tries to explain the actions of conservative politicians in the realm of reason and logic. While this on one hand lends strength to Nichols’ argument by introducing a materialist analysis of these individuals’ behavior, it ultimately fails to address the roles of enjoyment and fantasy that are central to conservative politics. Speaking of fantasy, there is also no mention of the conservative media that promoted misinformation and vaccine hesitancy or the liberal media that often weaponized the virus and their coverage of it for their bottom lines. Overall, while he does tell a few stories of everyday people who were exploited and faced the lethal consequences of their bosses’ actions, Nichol’s analysis is ultimately a top-down assessment of the coronavirus crisis. While this lends credence to his insistence on popular judgment on these powerful individuals, it also ignores much of the exploitation that occurred in the lower rungs of power, whether by landlords, business owners, or the media.

Conclusion:

Overall, Coronavirus Criminals and Pandemic Profiteers is a well-researched and thorough case against those whose deliberate actions or passive inaction led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands. While it lacks any in-depth analysis and relies heavily on direct quotes for much of its content, Nichols writes with vivacity and a wave of righteous anger that could spur even the most apathetic to action. Despite its occasionally hyperbolic rhetoric, Nichols’ work is a quick refresher on those most responsible for the COVID crisis, offering a clarion call for those who want to bring them to justice. With over one million US citizens dead, we must hold our leaders accountable before our collective apathy leads us to shrug off this grave and immense injustice. While I’m ultimately skeptical of such action in the face of a fractured Left and a deeply conservative Supreme Court, Nichols calls on us to act now and set a clear precedent, or else face even greater consequences down the road.