Trump news: Trump visits golf course for second day in a row as coronavirus deaths near 100,000

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As the nation's death toll approaches 100,000 lives lost during the coronavirus pandemic, Donald Trump was spotted playing golf on Saturday and Sunday, as crowds of people flocked to beaches and parties over Memorial Day weekend despite growing infection rates across the US.

The president also shared sexist insults about his political rivals, including one message that called Hillary Clinton a "skank", while also spending the weekend on Twitter floating conspiracy theories about MSNBC host Joe Scarborough.

After encouraging Americans to spend the weekend outdoors and at the golf course, White House health official Dr Deborah Birx defended her remarks following reports of massive crowds over the holiday weekend and suggested that Americans need to change their behaviour and follow physical distancing guidelines, which are beginning to ease in most states after weeks of quarantine.

Offline, Mr Trump spent the holiday weekend at his Virginia golf club, where he was captured putting, driving his golf cart and waving to supporters.

In another apparent attempt to undermine the results of an election, the president also continued to push his false claim that mail-in or absentee voting would lead to voter fraud, a falsehood that even a commission that he appointed to investigate had failed to find any evidence.

"The United States cannot have all Mail In Ballots. It will be the greatest Rigged Election in history," Mr Trump said on Twitter. "People grab them from mailboxes, print thousands of forgeries and 'force' people to sign. Also, forge names."

There is no evidence to suggest this happens.

The president's top economic adviser meanwhile has predicted that the unemployment rate will remain in double digits by the 2020 presidential election in November and hit 20 per cent by the end of May, as the number of unemployed Americans continues to creep upward.

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