Obama takes jab at U.S. gov't over coronavirus response

Former President Barack Obama took a jab at the U.S. government on Saturday over its response to the coronavirus pandemic.

"More than anything, this pandemic has fully, finally torn back the curtain on the idea that so many of the folks in charge know what they're doing," Obama said during a virtual commencement speech for historically black colleges and universities, without naming specific officials.

"A lot of them aren't even pretending to be in charge," he added.

In a virtual commencement speech for the high school class of 2020 hours later, Obama said "the world is turned upside down" by the pandemic and that it "has shaken up the status quo and laid bare a lot of our country's deep-seated problems -- from massive economic inequality to ongoing racial disparities to a lack of basic health care."

"If we're going to save the environment and defeat future pandemics, then we're going to have to do it together," he noted.

More than 1.46 million people in the United States have infected with the coronavirus, with at least 88,754 deaths, according to a tally from Johns Hopkins University on Saturday. Both numbers are far higher than those in any other country or region.