Kushner boasted that Trump was 'getting the country back from the doctors' in newly released recording

• White House senior adviser Jared Kushner bragged that President Donald Trump was "getting the country back from the doctors" earlier this year.
• "Trump's now back in charge. It's not the doctors," Kushner told journalist Bob Woodward in an interview from April.
• Kushner also described Trump's lead to "open-up" the economy following nationwide coronavirus restrictions as a "comeback phase," in newly released audiotapes from CNN.

White House senior adviser Jared Kushner bragged about President Donald Trump's push to drown out scientific expertise and reopen the economy in the early days of coronavirus pandemic, according to newly released audio.

Kushner, the president's son-in-law, told journalist Bob Woodward that Trump was "getting the country back from the doctors," in an interview on April 18.

"Trump's now back in charge," he said in recordings obtained by CNN. "It's not the doctors. They've kind of – we have, like, a negotiated settlement."

The remarks occured one day after Trump tweeted out support for protests against coronavirus restrictions, calling on states such as Michigan, Virginia and Minnesota to "LIBERATE."

Back then, Kushner described Trump's move to "open-up" the country as an entering of the "comeback phase."

"There's the panic phase, the pain phase and then the comeback phase," he told Woodward. "I do believe that last night symbolized kind of the beginning of the comeback phase."

At the time, governors had implemented stay-at-home orders to combat further spread of the disease. COVID-19 cases had been spiking in parts of the East Coast, severely hitting states such as New York and New Jersey, and gradually making its way across the country. As infections were on the rise, public health experts within the Trump administration had warned against a premature reopening that could lead to bigger outbreaks.

"That doesn't mean there's not still a lot of pain and there won't be pain for a while, but that basically was, we've now put out rules to get back to work," Kushner said.

Kushner's comments add to the emerging record of how the White House tried to steer attention away from the pandemic in its critical, early days. They also align with Trump's downplaying of the virus in a February interview with Woodward. The president and his allies have been heavily criticized for ignoring warnings about the virus and not heeding scientific advice, which they have continued to do in recent days.

A White House press release published on Tuesday detailing Trump's accomplishments had "ending the COVID-19 pandemic" on its list. Similarly, at a rally on Saturday, Trump said the US is "rounding the turn" on coronavirus. And on Monday, the president called the media "losers" for continuing to cover the surging pandemic.

Currently, the US is experiencing its highest numbers of infections since the public health crisis began. The seven-day average is 73,094 cases, a 39% increase from two weeks earlier, according to the New York Times. As of October 28, more than 8.8 million have contracted the disease and 226,000 people have died in the country.