WASHINGTON, United States (AFP)— President Donald Trump insisted Thursday that he never lied to Americans about the dangers of coronavirus after a bombshell new book by journalist Bob Woodward revealed that he deliberately tried to downplay the crisis.

Trump’s taped admission to Woodward that he minimized the pandemic in public, while being aware of the unique danger from COVID-19, has set off alarm bells less than eight weeks before election day.

Asked bluntly at a hastily organized White House press conference “Why did you lie to the American people?” Trump responded: “I didn’t lie.”

The Republican, who is down in the polls against Democrat Joe Biden and faces overwhelming disapproval from Americans on his handling of the coronavirus crisis, insisted that he’d softened the dangers in public so as to preserve calm.

“I think we did a great job, Trump said.  “I don’t want to jump up and down and start screaming ‘Death! Death!'”

But Trump has been thrown onto the defensc after multiple excerpts and recordings from Woodward’s book “Rage” were released on Wednesday.

That night he pushed back with a call-in to his friend, Fox News personality Sean Hannity. Early Thursday, he followed up with a Fox News Radio interview focused on his nomination by a right-wing member of Norway’s parliament for the Nobel Peace Prize.

He then fired dozens of tweets in wildly random directions through the day, from extolling the “good health” of North Korean strongman Kim Jong Un to criticising Woodward and retweeting a fan whose dress he admired at a recent election rally.

Trump was to continue his PR blitz with another rally in Michigan later Thursday.