Trump blames Obama on CORONAVIRUS testing
During a briefing with the press in the White House on Wednesday, President
Donald Trump seemed to blame the issues with testing
the coronavirus on the Obama administration.
Trump told reporters, “The Obama administration made a decision on testing that turned out to be very detrimental to what we’re doing and we undid that decision a few days ago so that the testing can take place in a much more accurate and rapid fashion.”
He continued, “That was a decision that we disagreed with, I don’t think we would have made it but for some reason, it was made but we’ve undone that decision.”
Moments later, a reporter asked Trump what Obama-era rule they were talking about.
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Vice President
Mike Pence — who Trump has put in charge of a coronavirus task force — responded:
As
The New York Times notes, there was a regulation under the Obama administration that closely monitored how state and private companies could implement testing that is not approved by the FDA.
Obama did not respond to the president’s remarks but he did address the coronavirus in a tweet on Wednesday, writing, “Protect yourself and your community from coronavirus with common sense precautions: wash your hands, stay home when sick and listen to the CDC and local health authorities.”
“Save the masks for health care workers,” he added. “Let’s stay calm, listen to the experts and follow the science.”
And this fact :
The Trump administration fired the U.S. pandemic response team in 2018 to cut costs.
And just in :
White House Bans Filming At Coronavirus Briefing, Triggering Backlash....
The Trump White House faced widespread criticism on Tuesday after Vice President Mike Pence conducted a press briefing on the
coronavirus outbreak, but
members of the media were not allowed to record video or audio.
The administration ― which only last week vowed to be “
aggressively transparent” with the public about the spread of the virus that has now killed nine people in the U.S. ― only allowed still photographs to be taken, CNN’s Jim Acosta and other journalists in attendance tweeted.
“I asked Pence why the Coronavirus briefing is off camera today. He said he believes the briefing will be back on cam tomorrow,” Acosta later posted, noting “the closest thing to an explanation we got” was “when Pence said Trump was on camera a bunch today.”
Obama-era White House chief photographer Pete Souza said he “can’t ever remember a time when a VP or POTUS spoke in the White House press briefing room and video/audio was prohibited.”
“It’s like they’re imploding,” added Walter Shaub, the former head of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics.
The Trump administration’s coronavirus response has been widely criticized as disorganized and slow. Trump himself has repeatedly sought to downplay the risks,
sometimes with outright falsehoods....... No audio / video of briefing on a virus that is spreading ....... amazing.
