Mr. Hassett said the dots at the end — the ones showing deaths trailing off to near zero by May 16 — were not a prediction and were never understood by anyone in the White House to be one. He said that he had never shown the curve to the president or any members of the White House coronavirus task force, and that the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, has confirmed to him that no one in the administration has ever used the chart as a forecasting tool.

Source: New York Times May 06, 2020 20:10 UTC