Shot Chasers: How Officials in Trump's Lame-Duck White House Scrambled to Score COVID-19 Vaccination
… Among this group, Vanity Fair has learned, were chiefs of staff of cabinet agencies, some of whose bosses had become notorious for publicly disregarding pandemic safeguards like mask wearing. They wanted to know, “Would they be able to get four or six doses for their front office?” said a former senior administration official. Though some would claim to be inquiring on behalf of their teams, the official said, in fact “their ask was not about their employees.”
Though it is not clear who ultimately succeeded in crashing the list, which morphed continuously as names were punted off of it and then mysteriously reappeared, most petitioners ran into a surprisingly hard line. “It ain’t happening,” was a common refrain, said one career official familiar with the decision-making. In part this was because Meadows—who, like many working in the White House, contracted COVID-19 late last year—had received explicit directions from his boss. On December 13, President Trump tweeted that White House employees would wait their turn unless “specifically necessary.”…
Why, in a White House infamous for flouting pandemic precautions, would some political appointees in the executive branch show such determination in attempting to score a shot? According to the former senior administration official, the answer is simple enough: Vaccinations would enable these high-flying rule flouters to “maintain” their active lifestyles.
The previously unreported struggle over the White House list was just one front in a sprawling secret war that raged for months at the highest levels of the federal government. The question of how to equitably vaccinate a federal workforce of 2.1 million people in the midst of a presidential transition ended up pitting the National Security Council against officials from Operation Warp Speed, and career staff against political appointees. It also sparked resentment, suspicions of missing doses, and allegations of line jumping…
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