This hypothesis is bolstered by the curious way in which Trump is constantly bragging about how he expedited everything and got the vaccine out in record time, which could be interpreted as trolling them. It is also bolstered by the fact that the US reopened sooner than almost anywhere in the world (most states, anyways, even many blue ones), in contrast to the lingering closures and restrictions virtually everywhere else, in spite of vax rollouts, which lend weight to your argument that the original intention was to keep lockdowns going much longer.

This hypothesis is bolstered by the curious way in which Trump is constantly bragging about how he expedited everything and got the vaccine out in record time, which could be interpreted as trolling them. It is also bolstered by the fact that the US reopened sooner than almost anywhere in the world (most states, anyways, even many blue ones), with the lingering closures and restrictions virtually everywhere else, in spite of vax rollouts, giving weight to your argument that the original intention was to keep lockdowns going much longer.