Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Remarks by Trump, Pence, and Members of the Coronavirus Task Force in Press Briefing, 04-19-2020
Please go here to see video clips of the highlights:
https://twitter.com/atrupar
PRESS BRIEFINGS
Remarks by President Trump, Vice President Pence, and Members of the Coronavirus Task Force in Press Briefing
HEALTHCARE
Issued on: April 20, 2020
James S. Brady Press Briefing Room
April 19, 2020
6:28 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. I’d like to begin by saying that we’re continuing to negotiate with the Democrats to get our great workers and small businesses all over the country taken care of. I think we — we’re getting close to a deal. It could happen. It could happen. A lot of good work has been going on, and we could have an answer tomorrow. And we’re going to see what — what exactly does take place.
We’re also looking at helping our hospitals and our rural hospitals, who have been hurt very badly. The rural hospitals, for a long time, have not been treated properly. We’re looking to help them, and beyond. So we’re looking at hospitals also, as part of the package. And we’ll see how that all comes out.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: That’s — somebody said to me, “President, you look tired.” I said, “I should be tired.” We should all be tired. But we have to win, right?
ADMIRAL GIROIR: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: Tomorrow, the President — the Vice President will lead a call with our nation’s governors from FEMA headquarters, Mike —
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: — to review what more they can do and do together to develop locally tailored testing strategies. Working very hard with governors now on testing. We want to help them out.
{snip}
We do have a clip that I thought would be appropriate to put up today. It’ll take two minutes, and I think you’ll find it interesting. But we appreciate it.
And let’s see if we can do that. You’ll turn out the lights, and we’ll see if we can do that. Thank you.
(A video is played.)
We actually had something else. Are they finished with it? They left out the good part. Great — great job, fellas.
Q What was the good part?
THE PRESIDENT: They did a better job on ventilators. No — Andrew had something else to say that was really nice, but we won’t go through that. But he really — I mean, it was really a good statement.
Do you want to put the rest of it up, or do you not have it?
I just think it’s so good because it’s bipartisan. You know, this is not about Democrats, Republicans. This is about a thing that hit our country, the likes of which has never happened to us before. Wars — those wars, Civil War. Sure. The First World War, the Second World War — they’re not fought on this country. This is being fought on this country. But it’s being fought in 184 countries all over the world. It’s terrible.
{snip}
Through the Project Airbridge, we’ve completed 64 flights carrying over 600 million pieces of personal protective equipment, such as gloves, gowns, and other medical gear, with 50 more flights scheduled in the very near future.
The team doing that is an incredible team of military people and young geniuses. Some are older geniuses, but mostly younger geniuses, I think I can say. Some people that made vast amounts of money in Silicon Valley. You know, these are very smart people. The job they’ve done is incredible. And I said, “Where do you come from?” “Well, I sold my company, sir.” “Oh, really? How much did you get?” I think he said $700 million. I said, “That’s good. You want to work for the government?” No, I want to help our country, sir. And it’s tremendous brainpower. It’s a beautiful thing to see.
Young, incredible people that love this country, and they worked with the military. Admiral, you would say they were pretty smart, right?
ADMIRAL GIROIR: Yes, sir,
THE PRESIDENT: They were in the upper scales of IQ?
ADMIRAL GIROIR: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: They were the upper. They were the — they were the top scale, I’ll tell you. And they’re great people.
{snip}
Moreover, we’re bringing supply chains back home, and we’ve learned a lot about supply chains. We’ve learned that it’s nice to make things in the U.S. I’ve been saying that for a long time. One of the reasons I ran for office — because we started making things everywhere but here. And if one thing comes out of this, more than anything else, is that we should make product in the United States.
And these supply chains, they sound wonderful, but if one country has a problem, the whole chain is ruined. And I’ve been saying it for a long time. I ran partially on that. I ran partially on that. I ran on that, and I ran very strongly against China. And then we made a great trade deal where they buy $250 billion. They’re supposed to. And they’re paying tariffs. They paid us tens of billions of dollars. I’ve given $12 billion one year, $16 billion another year, and $19 billion to our farmers and ranchers who were targeted.
But, you know, I ran on China and other countries, the way they were ripping us off. They were ripping off our country. And China understood that. I mean, China fully understood that. And they’re big, strong, smart people. And I wasn’t friendly, and it wasn’t a friendly situation. And we ended up making an incredible deal with China for tens of billions of dollars of product: $40- to $50 billion to the farmers. The most they ever spent was 15 to 16; now they’re supposed to spend 40 to 50.
Now, of course, the — the virus came along, and I’m not happy. I’m not happy. And I let him know I’m not happy. So, you know, we had a great relationship with — we had a very bad relationship with China. Then we had a good relationship, because we made a great deal.
But we’re not happy. This is not a good thing that happened. It came out of China, so we’re not — we’re not in a position where we’re going to say much yet.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. Very good.
Is Seema here? Seema, you’ve done such a great job. Please, come up and say a couple of words. Thank you.
ADMINISTRATOR VERMA: Thank you, Mr. Vice President and Mr. President. So, just a few weeks ago, we stood here and asked the American healthcare system to delay elective surgeries and procedures. And the reason why we did this is we wanted to make sure that the healthcare system could deal with any surges. We wanted to preserve equipment and make sure that they had the appropriate workforce to handle any surge. And our healthcare system did a fantastic job. They very quickly stood up telehealth services. And under the President’s leadership, we started paying for these services under the Medicare program.
But the reality is, not everything can be addressed by telehealth. And maybe a woman that needs surgery for breast cancer, somebody who has cataracts in their eyes that need to be able to see better, and sometimes the doctor just needs to be able to listen to their patient’s heart. We’ve heard across the country that doctors’ offices have closed and many healthcare systems are furloughing their staff, nurses and doctors.
Under the President’s leadership, we’ve put out over $90 billion in accelerated payments under the Medicare program, provided $30 billion of grants, with more dollars on the way.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, Seema.
And Dr. Hahn is here. If you need, he’ll tell you maybe a little bit later, if you want this — but I can tell you that, very simply: The level at which they are approving things, tests, and being on top of the people that are doing the testing for therapies and for vaccines has never — they’ve never seen anything like this. So I want to thank you very much. And stick around. Maybe they’ll have some questions.
Okay? Please, go ahead. In the back.
Q Mr. President, thank you very much. If there were groups of people planning to protest tomorrow against the government shutdown, what would be your advice?
THE PRESIDENT: Against the shutdown?
Q Well, yeah. That they want the shutdown lifted. Should they go ahead if it’s in —
THE PRESIDENT: They want it lifted? Yeah.
Q — a state where there haven’t been 14 days —
THE PRESIDENT: Please. I don’t have any advice. People feel that way. You’re allowed to protest. I mean, they — they feel that way.
I watched a protest and they were all six feet apart. I mean, it was a very orderly group of people. But, you know, some — some have gone too far. Some governors have gone too far. Some of the things that happened are maybe not so appropriate.
And I think, in the end, it’s not going to matter because we’re starting to open up our states. And I think they’re going to open up very well. We’re going to be watching it. We’re going to be watching it very closely. We’re working with them on testing. We’re working with them on whatever they need. I don’t think they need ventilators anymore.
I believe the term the governor used was “phenomenal.” We’ve done a phenomenal job. That was the term that — that was the only sentence they left out, which is okay. But I — I appreciate that that’s what Governor Cuomo said. But we have — they’ve done a phenomenal — these people have done a phenomenal job.
As far as protesters — you know, I see protesters for all sorts of things. And I’m with everybody. I’m with everybody.
Please, in the back. Go ahead. In the back. Go ahead. Are you ready? Yeah.
Q Yes, please. Thank you, Mr. President. Jenn Pellegrino with OAN. Yesterday, you pointed out that Iran was likely not truthful in their reporting of the virus. Meanwhile, Senator Dianne Feinstein and other Democrats are looking for $5 billion in aid to Iran. Are you considering giving any aid to Iran?
THE PRESIDENT: If Iran needed aid on this, I would be willing to do something, if they want it. If they’d ask for it, I would be certainly willing. They were hit very hard. Obviously, those numbers weren’t correct numbers that they reported. But if they needed help, if they needed aid, if they needed ventilators — we have thousands of ventilators currently on hand, and ventilators under construction, under — that are under construction.
That’s a mosquito. I don’t like mosquitoes. I don’t like mosquitoes at all.
But if they — yeah, we would certainly be willing to help. What they should do is be smart and make a deal.
It’s only because of — you know, you look at what happened. It’s — John Kerry, I guess, just doesn’t want them to make a deal. And they’re probably figuring they can wait and maybe it will be Biden. And they’ll own America if Biden gets — and they know, with me, doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t work that way. If — if Joe Biden got in, they’d own America. Between them, China, Japan, Mexico, Canada, they’d own America. You wouldn’t have a country left if he got in.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. Ummm —
Q Mr. President, you had called on me.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. I did.
Q Thank you, I appreciate it. Since you shared with us something else that you saw on TV today, I have a question about something you said on Thursday, which is that you were “angry” because information about the virus “should have been told to us” earlier and “a lot sooner.” “People knew it was happening, and people did not want to talk about it.”
THE PRESIDENT: That’s right.
Q Many Americans are saying the exact same thing about you, that you should have warned them the virus was spreading like wildfire through the month of February, instead of holding rallies with thousands of people. Why did you wait so long —
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, who are you with?
Q — to warn them?
THE PRESIDENT: Who — who are you with?
Q And why did you not —
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q — have social distancing until March 16th?
THE PRESIDENT: Who are you with?
Q I’m Weijia Jiang with CBS News.
THE PRESIDENT: So if you look at what I did in terms of cutting off or banning China from coming in —
Q Chinese nationals. But, by the way, not Americans who were —
THE PRESIDENT: Nice and easy.
Q — also coming in from China.
THE PRESIDENT: Nice and easy. Just relax.
We cut it off. People were amazed. These gentlemen, everybody was amazed that I did it. We had 21 people in a room; everybody was against it but me. Dr. Fauci said, had I not done that, perhaps tens of thousands — and maybe much more than that — people would have died. I was very early. Very, very early.
And we just saw — you saw Bret Baier making a statement. They had a debate well into February and not even mentioned — it wasn’t even mentioned — the Democrats.
Q And you’re the President, sir —
THE PRESIDENT: We were very early. Oh, I — I’m the President.
Q — and you didn’t warn people that it was —
THE PRESIDENT: And you what I just did?
Q — spreading so quickly.
THE PRESIDENT: And you know what I just —
Q And, by the way, when you issued the ban, the virus was already here.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. And you know how many people — when I used the ban — how many cases of virus were in the United States when I issued the ban? Do you know the number?
Q There was — there were already —
THE PRESIDENT: No, no — how many cases? Remember, I said, “one person.” How many cases were here when I issued the ban? Tell me.
Q But did you know that it was going to spread and become a pandemic?
THE PRESIDENT: No, no, no, you have to do your research. How many —
Q I did my research. On the 23rd of March, you said you knew this was going to be a pandemic well —
THE PRESIDENT: Can I tell you what?
Q — before the WHO.
THE PRESIDENT: I did know it. I did know it. All I have to do is look.
Q So you know it was going to spread.
THE PRESIDENT: All — anybody knew it. Just — are you ready? How many cases were in the United States when I did my ban? How many people had died in the United States?
Q So do you acknowledge that you didn’t think it was —
THE PRESIDENT: Keep your voice down, please.
Q — going to spread?
THE PRESIDENT: Keep your voice down.
Q Did you not think it was going to spread?
THE PRESIDENT: How many — how many — how many cases were in the United States? I did a ban where I’m closing up the entire country. How many people died?
Q And that’s a fair point.
THE PRESIDENT: How many people died in the United States? And yet I closed up the country, and I believe there were no deaths — zero deaths — at the time I closed up the country. Nobody was there. And you should say “thank you very much” for good judgment.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, ma’am. Go ahead, please.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. I have two Nevada questions. First one: The mayor of Las Vegas thinks it’s “total insanity” for business to be shut down in Nevada, which the Governor, Sisolak, ordered. Who’s right?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, they shut one of my hotels down too. Okay? So, you know —
Q I am well aware.
THE PRESIDENT: I’m not involved in that. I couldn’t be if I wanted to, I just chose not to be. By the way, just so you know, I could be if I wanted to, but I chose not. But they closed a very big hotel that I have in Nevada, down in Las Vegas.
It’s a very severe step he took. I’m okay with it. I’m okay with it. But, you know — I mean, you could call that one either way. I know the mayor is very upset with it. Some owners are very upset with it. Some of the developers out there very upset. Others, they say, “Hey, we got to get rid of it.” I can — I can see both sides of that.
{snip}
Q And what is the administration doing to make sure that, you know, hotel chains and hedge funds do not access funds?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that’s another one. Yeah — no, that’s another one. You have hotels that have big, massive buildings that are under-levered. But if you have no income at all coming out — no income at all — these hotels are — they go from under-levered to they have to be closed down. It’s a terrible thing.
I don’t know that they’re working on that specific problem, but it’s a problem they should be talking about. I mean, you have people that own a hotel where they go from having a very successful hotel with, you know, many employees — thousands of people — to, all of a sudden, closing it down.
I read where my wonderful place in Florida, in Miami — Doral — they had to let a lot of the employees go because it’s essentially closed. You can’t use it. You’re not — you can’t have the restaurants. You can’t have the — so, you know, you have to close it down. That’s a — that’s an example of many, many hotels are closing down throughout the country. And hopefully they’re going to be able to open up relatively quickly.
Q But the funds, sir, were specifically for small businesses.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q Would you — would the administration make sure that that’s —
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it depends how the hotel is considered. You know, is it owned by a big chain? But even if it’s owned by a big chain, that’s devastating. If they have 200 hotels in the country and they’re closed, and it’s not only in the country — remember this: This is all over the world. You know, if they have — they could have 2,000 hotels that are in other countries; they’re also closed. We’re in — we’re in better shape than most, when you think about it.
So I think we’re going to be looking at it. I think it’s a very big problem. And it’s a lot of people employed.
Yeah, here we go.
Q Mr. President, 22 — more than 22 million Americans are currently unemployed —
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q — as a result of this. Today we hit the grim milestone of more than 40,000 Americans now having died from the coronavirus. Can you explain then why you come out here and you are reading clips and showing clips of praise for you and for your administration? Is this really the time for self-congratulations?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I will tell you this: What I’m doing is I’m standing up for the men and women that have done such an incredible job — not for me; for the men and women — admirals, Vice President, if I might. But all of the men and women, thousands — tens of thousands of them that built hospitals in New York and New Jersey and all over this country in record time. They’d throw up 1,000 beds in four days. I’m sticking up for those people. Those people have been incredible. I’m also sticking up for doctors and nurses and military doctors and nurses.
Q But the clips that you played and what you read earlier was praising you and your administration specifically —
THE PRESIDENT: All I played today was Governor Cuomo —
Q Why is now the moment to do that, sir?
THE PRESIDENT: — saying very positive things about the job the federal government has done. And those people —
Q On the day where more than 40,000 Americans have now died.
THE PRESIDENT: And those — those people have been just absolutely excoriated by some of the fake news, like you. You’re CNN; you’re fake news.
And let me just tell you, they were excoriated by people like you that don’t know any better, because you don’t have the brains you were born with. You should be praising the people that have done a good job, not doing what you do. Even that question.
So just so you understand, if we didn’t —
Q The question is: “Why now, sir?”
THE PRESIDENT: — do a job —
Q The question is “why now,” not “why are you doing it,” but why now?
THE PRESIDENT: I’ll tell you why now. Are you ready?
Q Yeah.
THE PRESIDENT: Because these people are, right now, in hospitals. It’s dangerous. It’s going to a battlefield. And I want these people — I want you —
Q This wasn’t about hospital workers, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: I want you and —
Q This wasn’t about the doctors.
THE PRESIDENT: It’s all about that.
Q This was about you and your administration.
THE PRESIDENT: It’s not about me. No, nothing is about me.
Q That was what you read.
THE PRESIDENT: Look — look, you’re never going to treat me fairly — many of you. And I understand that. I don’t even know — I got here with the worst, most unfair press treatment, they say, in the history of the United States for a President. They did say Abraham Lincoln had very bad treatment too.
Q Sir, the Wall Street journal headline you just read has your name in it. It talks about “Trump remaking the playbook.”
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that’s a positive thing, because that’s an exercise in how to do it and what to do. And that’s good for the future. People can learn from that. But I want the men and women of this country that are in danger — the admirals and the generals that have done a job like they’ve never done before. They’re in war. We’re in war. You know, I call it the “invisible enemy.” That’s the war, and it’s a dangerous war.
We’re also at a level when you said “40,000 people” — and you’re right: almost 40,000 people. And —
Q More than.
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, “more than.” Okay, good. Correct me.
Q We’re at 41,000.
THE PRESIDENT: Good. Well, I’m really glad you corrected me, CNN.
But here’s the story. Let me just tell you something: If we didn’t do what we did, the 40,000 right now could be a million people. It could be a million people, not 40,000. It could be a million.
We’re tracking at much less than the lowest possible estimate. And that’s a great tribute to a number of people and a number of things. One of the things that it’s a tribute to is what’s taken place in this country with the American people, because they’ve gone inside. They’ve done it. They’ve done a job that nobody thought was possible.
And, in fact, when they did the models, as they call them, nobody thought it was possible. They did models not based on this kind of success.
I’ve seen New York streets, and I see it in the morning — I’ve watched, all my life, New York streets — and you can’t even see the pavement, there’s so many people. And you take a look this morning; you take a look — even on Friday morning, I looked at it, I saw it through a camera — there wasn’t a person on Fifth Avenue; there wasn’t a person on Madison Avenue. I’ve never seen anything like it. Because people have really listened to instructions, and they’ve listened to what we’ve had to say — and the professionals. They’ve listened.
And those people — people should really give them a lot of credit, including people like you, because you just don’t have the sense to understand what’s going on.
All right. Yeah, please. Go ahead.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. Should publicly traded companies like Shake Shack and Quantum Corp and Ruth’s Chris — should they have access to the PPP program?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it would depend. It would depend. A lot of those — I don’t know much about any of those companies, but a lot of times, they’re owned by franchisees where they own one or two places, and, you know, they are small businesses. So a lot of that would — that would depend on what the formula is.
But again, many of those companies are — you know, they’re out — they’re franchisees. A franchisee could open up one of the places that you mentioned. And so, yeah, I would say that’s important, actually. That’s like a restaurant.
Go ahead, please.
Q You know, these — you referred to these protests earlier. You know, some of them are getting pretty intense and were actually getting some death threats to some governors who are reluctant to reopen.
THE PRESIDENT: You are, in the media?
Q No, the governors are getting death threats. You know, governors of Kentucky, Michigan, Virginia. They’re getting increased level of death threats. And are you concerned that your talk about liberation and the Second Amendment and all this stuff —
THE PRESIDENT: No. No, no.
Q — are you inciting violence among a few people who are (inaudible)?
THE PRESIDENT: I’ve seen the people. I’ve seen interviews of the people. These are great people. Look, they want to get — they call it “cabin fever.” You’ve heard the term. They’ve got cabin fever. They want to get back. They want their life back. Their life was taken away from them.
And, you know, they learned a lot during this period. They learned to do things differently than they have in the past, and, you know, they’ll do it hopefully until the virus has passed. And when the virus passes, I hope we’re going to be sitting next to each other in baseball games, football games, basketball games, ice hockey games. I hope we’re going to be sitting next to each other. I hope you have golf tourn- — the Masters is going to have 100,000 people, not 25 people watching at the course.
Q Are worried about violence though? I mean, some of them (inaudible) threats at them.
THE PRESIDENT: I am not. No, I’m not. I think these people are — I’ve never seen so many American flags. I mean, I’m seeing the same thing that you’re seeing. I don’t see it any differently.
Q There are Nazi flags out there too.
THE PRESIDENT: They are who?
Q Nazis flags.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that I totally would say, “No way.” But I’ve seen — I didn’t see that. I see all — of course, I’m sure the news plays that up. I’ve seen American flags all over the place. I have never seen so many American flags at a rally as I have at these rallies. These people love our country. They want to get back to work.
Q Mr. President —
THE PRESIDENT: Please. Go ahead.
Q Have you thought any more about pardoning Paul Manafort or Roger Stone so they’re not exposed to coronavirus in jail?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I’ll just tell you this: Roger Stone was treated very unfairly. Paul Manafort — the black book turned out to be a fraud. We learned that out during the various last number of weeks and months. They had a black book that came out of Ukraine. It turned out to be a fraud. It turned out to be a fraud. They convicted a man; it turned out to be a fraud.
General Flynn was a highly respected person, and it turned out to be a scam on him. The FBI said he didn’t lie. And Mueller’s people wanted him to go to jail. Okay?
Q So why not issue a pardon?
THE PRESIDENT: So what am I going to do? You’ll find out what I’m going do. I’m not going to say what I’m going to do.
But I will tell you, the whole thing turned out to be a scam, and it turned out to be a disgrace to our country, and it was a takedown of a duly elected president.
And these people suffered greatly. General Flynn — I mean, what they did to him. And even the FBI said — and they had some — and nobody a bigger fan of the FBI than me, at the level of the people that really matter. But the top of the FBI was scum.
And what they did to General Flynn — and you know it, and everybody knows it — was a disgrace. He was in the service for over 30 years. He ends up being a general and respected. Respected. And almost his first day in office, they come in with papers; they want to investigate him. It never happened before. And now the tables are turned. Investigate the investigators, I guess.
These were crooked people. These are bad people. These are very dangerous people. You know what they are though? They’re scum. They’re human scum.
All right. Do you want to have one? In the back, please.
Q Yes, please. Thank you, Mr. President. The CDC has finally admitted to profound failures with testing kits from the beginning of the outbreak. Is this a function of lax oversight from the Obama-Biden administration?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it’s not from me. I mean, they came in and they had some problems early on, but we’ve straightened it out. But yeah. I mean, look, I told you we inherited a lot of garbage. We took — they had tests that were no good. They had — all of this stuff was no good. It came from somewhere, so whoever — whoever came up with it.
But I’m proud to tell you that now we went from having a lot of bad things happening in CDC, to having great things happening where they’re doing a very good job now.
But, no, initially — look, our stockpiles were empty. We had horrible stockpiles. We had horrible ventilators. We had very few of them, too. And so did the states have very few of them.
But all of these things are — now we’re at a level that we’ve never been. The same with our military. Our military is the strongest it’s ever been. We spent one and a half trillion dollars on our military. We’ve totally rebuilt our military. It’s never been in a position. We even have Space Force. Mike and I were talking about what an achievement that is. The first time in 72 years, we have a new force.
So, yeah, CDC had obsolete tests, old tests, broken tests, and a mess. But they’ve — they’ve done a very good job. And they’ve done it under pressure. The pressure is, you know, this — they had to do this under pressure. So we’re very proud of the job they’ve done.
{snip}
Q On President Xi, you now talk about the missteps that China made early on in this crisis and how it put you — put the United States behind the curve.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, based on an investigation. We’re going to find out, yeah. Sure.
Q So when you repeatedly praised Xi in January and February —
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, this guy doesn’t stop.
Q — you said he will “solve the problem.” You said he was doing a “great job.” Were you duped by President Xi?
THE PRESIDENT: No, no, no, no. I made a deal that’s phenomenal for the United States. No, you know who was duped? You —
Q This is after the deal.
THE PRESIDENT: You and the Obama administration were duped for years because China was ripping off this country. Like in the history of any country, nobody has been ripped off like the United States by China — and many other countries. And we stop it. And we’ve done —
Q (Inaudible) why you praised him at the time?
THE PRESIDENT: And we’ve done — we’ve done a deal where they’re paying us 250 — they are buying 250 — they didn’t do anything for us. You know, we didn’t even have a deal. It was so bad —
Q This is after the deal. These comments are after the deal.
THE PRESIDENT: No, no. No, no. It’s — it is about a deal, because the deal started a long time ago, before anybody heard about this. The deal was finished a number of months ago. Very happy — I was very happy. I hope they were happy.
Billions of dollars came in, in tariffs. Billions of dollars. They’re going to be purchasing billions. And then, all of a sudden, long after that, I find out about this.
And I told you —
Q Right. But why, on February 23rd —
THE PRESIDENT: I told you I’m not —
Q — did you say, “I think he’s doing a very good job —
THE PRESIDENT: Listen. Listen, CNN.
Q — it’s a big problem, but” —
THE PRESIDENT: Listen, CNN. I told you I’m not happy about it. And this was after the deal. So we have this wonderful deal. And I was very — nobody has been tougher before the deal ever, on China, than Trump. Then I made a deal. I was very happy with the deal. It’s a great deal. Great for our farmers. The farmers have been paid a fortune already. Then what happened —
Q Was it a mistake to take his word for it?
THE PRESIDENT: Then what happened — no mistake. We made a great deal.
Now I find out after the deal — after the deal, not — after the deal —
Q Right. I’m talking about February 23rd.
THE PRESIDENT: I find out that I’m not happy — you people are so pathetic at CNN. Let me just tell you —
Q I have the quote here from February 23rd.
THE PRESIDENT: Sure. I was very happy with the deal, very happy with everything. Then we find out about the plague, right? The plague. And since we found out about that, I’m not happy.
But I closed it up long before Pelosi —
Q Right. This is after the —
THE PRESIDENT: Listen. Long before Pelosi. You know, she was having parties in San Francisco. “Let’s all go to Chinatown.” And that was a long time after the first —
Q This was after the travel restriction, sir. This was on February 23rd.
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead, please.
Q The first — the first of the month is next week —
THE PRESIDENT: That’s why your ratings are so bad, because you’re pathetic.
Go ahead. Let’s go.
Q I’m reading you your quote, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: Your ratings are terrible. You got to get back to real news.
{snip}
Q Mr. President, on state responsibility —
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead. In the back. You didn’t go. Go ahead.
Q Mr. President, thank you very much.
THE PRESIDENT: Who are you with?
Q I’m with the Salt Lake Tribune.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. Good.
Q Thank you, sir. On Thursday, the White House announced a congressional task force for reopening America. It included every Republican senator but Mitt Romney.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q Does that show that you’re still holding a grudge against Mitt Romney?
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, it does. Yeah. No, I’m not a fan of Mitt Romney at all. No, I had 52 Republican senators.
Q He was a governor. You don’t want his advice?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I just don’t think — you know, I’m not a fan of Mitt Romney. I don’t really want his advice.
Go ahead, please.
Q Mr. President, why on that task force did you include Senator Kelly Loeffler? There’s some questions about whether she may have —
THE PRESIDENT: Well, because she’s the senator from a great state, a state that I love: Georgia.
Q But there’s some insider trading issues with her.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I — that, I don’t know. I really don’t know about that. But she’s a senator from Georgia, and she was included in the list, absolutely.
{snip}
Thank you all very much. We appreciate it. We’ll see you tomorrow. Thank you.
END 7:57 P.M. EDT
Remarks by President Trump, Vice President Pence, and Members of the Coronavirus Task Force in Press Briefing
HEALTHCARE
Issued on: April 20, 2020
James S. Brady Press Briefing Room
April 19, 2020
6:28 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. I’d like to begin by saying that we’re continuing to negotiate with the Democrats to get our great workers and small businesses all over the country taken care of. I think we — we’re getting close to a deal. It could happen. It could happen. A lot of good work has been going on, and we could have an answer tomorrow. And we’re going to see what — what exactly does take place.
We’re also looking at helping our hospitals and our rural hospitals, who have been hurt very badly. The rural hospitals, for a long time, have not been treated properly. We’re looking to help them, and beyond. So we’re looking at hospitals also, as part of the package. And we’ll see how that all comes out.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: That’s — somebody said to me, “President, you look tired.” I said, “I should be tired.” We should all be tired. But we have to win, right?
ADMIRAL GIROIR: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: Tomorrow, the President — the Vice President will lead a call with our nation’s governors from FEMA headquarters, Mike —
THE VICE PRESIDENT: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: — to review what more they can do and do together to develop locally tailored testing strategies. Working very hard with governors now on testing. We want to help them out.
{snip}
We do have a clip that I thought would be appropriate to put up today. It’ll take two minutes, and I think you’ll find it interesting. But we appreciate it.
And let’s see if we can do that. You’ll turn out the lights, and we’ll see if we can do that. Thank you.
(A video is played.)
We actually had something else. Are they finished with it? They left out the good part. Great — great job, fellas.
Q What was the good part?
THE PRESIDENT: They did a better job on ventilators. No — Andrew had something else to say that was really nice, but we won’t go through that. But he really — I mean, it was really a good statement.
Do you want to put the rest of it up, or do you not have it?
I just think it’s so good because it’s bipartisan. You know, this is not about Democrats, Republicans. This is about a thing that hit our country, the likes of which has never happened to us before. Wars — those wars, Civil War. Sure. The First World War, the Second World War — they’re not fought on this country. This is being fought on this country. But it’s being fought in 184 countries all over the world. It’s terrible.
{snip}
Through the Project Airbridge, we’ve completed 64 flights carrying over 600 million pieces of personal protective equipment, such as gloves, gowns, and other medical gear, with 50 more flights scheduled in the very near future.
The team doing that is an incredible team of military people and young geniuses. Some are older geniuses, but mostly younger geniuses, I think I can say. Some people that made vast amounts of money in Silicon Valley. You know, these are very smart people. The job they’ve done is incredible. And I said, “Where do you come from?” “Well, I sold my company, sir.” “Oh, really? How much did you get?” I think he said $700 million. I said, “That’s good. You want to work for the government?” No, I want to help our country, sir. And it’s tremendous brainpower. It’s a beautiful thing to see.
Young, incredible people that love this country, and they worked with the military. Admiral, you would say they were pretty smart, right?
ADMIRAL GIROIR: Yes, sir,
THE PRESIDENT: They were in the upper scales of IQ?
ADMIRAL GIROIR: Yes, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: They were the upper. They were the — they were the top scale, I’ll tell you. And they’re great people.
{snip}
Moreover, we’re bringing supply chains back home, and we’ve learned a lot about supply chains. We’ve learned that it’s nice to make things in the U.S. I’ve been saying that for a long time. One of the reasons I ran for office — because we started making things everywhere but here. And if one thing comes out of this, more than anything else, is that we should make product in the United States.
And these supply chains, they sound wonderful, but if one country has a problem, the whole chain is ruined. And I’ve been saying it for a long time. I ran partially on that. I ran partially on that. I ran on that, and I ran very strongly against China. And then we made a great trade deal where they buy $250 billion. They’re supposed to. And they’re paying tariffs. They paid us tens of billions of dollars. I’ve given $12 billion one year, $16 billion another year, and $19 billion to our farmers and ranchers who were targeted.
But, you know, I ran on China and other countries, the way they were ripping us off. They were ripping off our country. And China understood that. I mean, China fully understood that. And they’re big, strong, smart people. And I wasn’t friendly, and it wasn’t a friendly situation. And we ended up making an incredible deal with China for tens of billions of dollars of product: $40- to $50 billion to the farmers. The most they ever spent was 15 to 16; now they’re supposed to spend 40 to 50.
Now, of course, the — the virus came along, and I’m not happy. I’m not happy. And I let him know I’m not happy. So, you know, we had a great relationship with — we had a very bad relationship with China. Then we had a good relationship, because we made a great deal.
But we’re not happy. This is not a good thing that happened. It came out of China, so we’re not — we’re not in a position where we’re going to say much yet.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. Very good.
Is Seema here? Seema, you’ve done such a great job. Please, come up and say a couple of words. Thank you.
ADMINISTRATOR VERMA: Thank you, Mr. Vice President and Mr. President. So, just a few weeks ago, we stood here and asked the American healthcare system to delay elective surgeries and procedures. And the reason why we did this is we wanted to make sure that the healthcare system could deal with any surges. We wanted to preserve equipment and make sure that they had the appropriate workforce to handle any surge. And our healthcare system did a fantastic job. They very quickly stood up telehealth services. And under the President’s leadership, we started paying for these services under the Medicare program.
But the reality is, not everything can be addressed by telehealth. And maybe a woman that needs surgery for breast cancer, somebody who has cataracts in their eyes that need to be able to see better, and sometimes the doctor just needs to be able to listen to their patient’s heart. We’ve heard across the country that doctors’ offices have closed and many healthcare systems are furloughing their staff, nurses and doctors.
Under the President’s leadership, we’ve put out over $90 billion in accelerated payments under the Medicare program, provided $30 billion of grants, with more dollars on the way.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much, Seema.
And Dr. Hahn is here. If you need, he’ll tell you maybe a little bit later, if you want this — but I can tell you that, very simply: The level at which they are approving things, tests, and being on top of the people that are doing the testing for therapies and for vaccines has never — they’ve never seen anything like this. So I want to thank you very much. And stick around. Maybe they’ll have some questions.
Okay? Please, go ahead. In the back.
Q Mr. President, thank you very much. If there were groups of people planning to protest tomorrow against the government shutdown, what would be your advice?
THE PRESIDENT: Against the shutdown?
Q Well, yeah. That they want the shutdown lifted. Should they go ahead if it’s in —
THE PRESIDENT: They want it lifted? Yeah.
Q — a state where there haven’t been 14 days —
THE PRESIDENT: Please. I don’t have any advice. People feel that way. You’re allowed to protest. I mean, they — they feel that way.
I watched a protest and they were all six feet apart. I mean, it was a very orderly group of people. But, you know, some — some have gone too far. Some governors have gone too far. Some of the things that happened are maybe not so appropriate.
And I think, in the end, it’s not going to matter because we’re starting to open up our states. And I think they’re going to open up very well. We’re going to be watching it. We’re going to be watching it very closely. We’re working with them on testing. We’re working with them on whatever they need. I don’t think they need ventilators anymore.
I believe the term the governor used was “phenomenal.” We’ve done a phenomenal job. That was the term that — that was the only sentence they left out, which is okay. But I — I appreciate that that’s what Governor Cuomo said. But we have — they’ve done a phenomenal — these people have done a phenomenal job.
As far as protesters — you know, I see protesters for all sorts of things. And I’m with everybody. I’m with everybody.
Please, in the back. Go ahead. In the back. Go ahead. Are you ready? Yeah.
Q Yes, please. Thank you, Mr. President. Jenn Pellegrino with OAN. Yesterday, you pointed out that Iran was likely not truthful in their reporting of the virus. Meanwhile, Senator Dianne Feinstein and other Democrats are looking for $5 billion in aid to Iran. Are you considering giving any aid to Iran?
THE PRESIDENT: If Iran needed aid on this, I would be willing to do something, if they want it. If they’d ask for it, I would be certainly willing. They were hit very hard. Obviously, those numbers weren’t correct numbers that they reported. But if they needed help, if they needed aid, if they needed ventilators — we have thousands of ventilators currently on hand, and ventilators under construction, under — that are under construction.
That’s a mosquito. I don’t like mosquitoes. I don’t like mosquitoes at all.
But if they — yeah, we would certainly be willing to help. What they should do is be smart and make a deal.
It’s only because of — you know, you look at what happened. It’s — John Kerry, I guess, just doesn’t want them to make a deal. And they’re probably figuring they can wait and maybe it will be Biden. And they’ll own America if Biden gets — and they know, with me, doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t work that way. If — if Joe Biden got in, they’d own America. Between them, China, Japan, Mexico, Canada, they’d own America. You wouldn’t have a country left if he got in.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. Ummm —
Q Mr. President, you had called on me.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. I did.
Q Thank you, I appreciate it. Since you shared with us something else that you saw on TV today, I have a question about something you said on Thursday, which is that you were “angry” because information about the virus “should have been told to us” earlier and “a lot sooner.” “People knew it was happening, and people did not want to talk about it.”
THE PRESIDENT: That’s right.
Q Many Americans are saying the exact same thing about you, that you should have warned them the virus was spreading like wildfire through the month of February, instead of holding rallies with thousands of people. Why did you wait so long —
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, who are you with?
Q — to warn them?
THE PRESIDENT: Who — who are you with?
Q And why did you not —
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q — have social distancing until March 16th?
THE PRESIDENT: Who are you with?
Q I’m Weijia Jiang with CBS News.
THE PRESIDENT: So if you look at what I did in terms of cutting off or banning China from coming in —
Q Chinese nationals. But, by the way, not Americans who were —
THE PRESIDENT: Nice and easy.
Q — also coming in from China.
THE PRESIDENT: Nice and easy. Just relax.
We cut it off. People were amazed. These gentlemen, everybody was amazed that I did it. We had 21 people in a room; everybody was against it but me. Dr. Fauci said, had I not done that, perhaps tens of thousands — and maybe much more than that — people would have died. I was very early. Very, very early.
And we just saw — you saw Bret Baier making a statement. They had a debate well into February and not even mentioned — it wasn’t even mentioned — the Democrats.
Q And you’re the President, sir —
THE PRESIDENT: We were very early. Oh, I — I’m the President.
Q — and you didn’t warn people that it was —
THE PRESIDENT: And you what I just did?
Q — spreading so quickly.
THE PRESIDENT: And you know what I just —
Q And, by the way, when you issued the ban, the virus was already here.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. And you know how many people — when I used the ban — how many cases of virus were in the United States when I issued the ban? Do you know the number?
Q There was — there were already —
THE PRESIDENT: No, no — how many cases? Remember, I said, “one person.” How many cases were here when I issued the ban? Tell me.
Q But did you know that it was going to spread and become a pandemic?
THE PRESIDENT: No, no, no, you have to do your research. How many —
Q I did my research. On the 23rd of March, you said you knew this was going to be a pandemic well —
THE PRESIDENT: Can I tell you what?
Q — before the WHO.
THE PRESIDENT: I did know it. I did know it. All I have to do is look.
Q So you know it was going to spread.
THE PRESIDENT: All — anybody knew it. Just — are you ready? How many cases were in the United States when I did my ban? How many people had died in the United States?
Q So do you acknowledge that you didn’t think it was —
THE PRESIDENT: Keep your voice down, please.
Q — going to spread?
THE PRESIDENT: Keep your voice down.
Q Did you not think it was going to spread?
THE PRESIDENT: How many — how many — how many cases were in the United States? I did a ban where I’m closing up the entire country. How many people died?
Q And that’s a fair point.
THE PRESIDENT: How many people died in the United States? And yet I closed up the country, and I believe there were no deaths — zero deaths — at the time I closed up the country. Nobody was there. And you should say “thank you very much” for good judgment.
{snip}
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, ma’am. Go ahead, please.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. I have two Nevada questions. First one: The mayor of Las Vegas thinks it’s “total insanity” for business to be shut down in Nevada, which the Governor, Sisolak, ordered. Who’s right?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, they shut one of my hotels down too. Okay? So, you know —
Q I am well aware.
THE PRESIDENT: I’m not involved in that. I couldn’t be if I wanted to, I just chose not to be. By the way, just so you know, I could be if I wanted to, but I chose not. But they closed a very big hotel that I have in Nevada, down in Las Vegas.
It’s a very severe step he took. I’m okay with it. I’m okay with it. But, you know — I mean, you could call that one either way. I know the mayor is very upset with it. Some owners are very upset with it. Some of the developers out there very upset. Others, they say, “Hey, we got to get rid of it.” I can — I can see both sides of that.
{snip}
Q And what is the administration doing to make sure that, you know, hotel chains and hedge funds do not access funds?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that’s another one. Yeah — no, that’s another one. You have hotels that have big, massive buildings that are under-levered. But if you have no income at all coming out — no income at all — these hotels are — they go from under-levered to they have to be closed down. It’s a terrible thing.
I don’t know that they’re working on that specific problem, but it’s a problem they should be talking about. I mean, you have people that own a hotel where they go from having a very successful hotel with, you know, many employees — thousands of people — to, all of a sudden, closing it down.
I read where my wonderful place in Florida, in Miami — Doral — they had to let a lot of the employees go because it’s essentially closed. You can’t use it. You’re not — you can’t have the restaurants. You can’t have the — so, you know, you have to close it down. That’s a — that’s an example of many, many hotels are closing down throughout the country. And hopefully they’re going to be able to open up relatively quickly.
Q But the funds, sir, were specifically for small businesses.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q Would you — would the administration make sure that that’s —
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it depends how the hotel is considered. You know, is it owned by a big chain? But even if it’s owned by a big chain, that’s devastating. If they have 200 hotels in the country and they’re closed, and it’s not only in the country — remember this: This is all over the world. You know, if they have — they could have 2,000 hotels that are in other countries; they’re also closed. We’re in — we’re in better shape than most, when you think about it.
So I think we’re going to be looking at it. I think it’s a very big problem. And it’s a lot of people employed.
Yeah, here we go.
Q Mr. President, 22 — more than 22 million Americans are currently unemployed —
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q — as a result of this. Today we hit the grim milestone of more than 40,000 Americans now having died from the coronavirus. Can you explain then why you come out here and you are reading clips and showing clips of praise for you and for your administration? Is this really the time for self-congratulations?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I will tell you this: What I’m doing is I’m standing up for the men and women that have done such an incredible job — not for me; for the men and women — admirals, Vice President, if I might. But all of the men and women, thousands — tens of thousands of them that built hospitals in New York and New Jersey and all over this country in record time. They’d throw up 1,000 beds in four days. I’m sticking up for those people. Those people have been incredible. I’m also sticking up for doctors and nurses and military doctors and nurses.
Q But the clips that you played and what you read earlier was praising you and your administration specifically —
THE PRESIDENT: All I played today was Governor Cuomo —
Q Why is now the moment to do that, sir?
THE PRESIDENT: — saying very positive things about the job the federal government has done. And those people —
Q On the day where more than 40,000 Americans have now died.
THE PRESIDENT: And those — those people have been just absolutely excoriated by some of the fake news, like you. You’re CNN; you’re fake news.
And let me just tell you, they were excoriated by people like you that don’t know any better, because you don’t have the brains you were born with. You should be praising the people that have done a good job, not doing what you do. Even that question.
So just so you understand, if we didn’t —
Q The question is: “Why now, sir?”
THE PRESIDENT: — do a job —
Q The question is “why now,” not “why are you doing it,” but why now?
THE PRESIDENT: I’ll tell you why now. Are you ready?
Q Yeah.
THE PRESIDENT: Because these people are, right now, in hospitals. It’s dangerous. It’s going to a battlefield. And I want these people — I want you —
Q This wasn’t about hospital workers, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: I want you and —
Q This wasn’t about the doctors.
THE PRESIDENT: It’s all about that.
Q This was about you and your administration.
THE PRESIDENT: It’s not about me. No, nothing is about me.
Q That was what you read.
THE PRESIDENT: Look — look, you’re never going to treat me fairly — many of you. And I understand that. I don’t even know — I got here with the worst, most unfair press treatment, they say, in the history of the United States for a President. They did say Abraham Lincoln had very bad treatment too.
Q Sir, the Wall Street journal headline you just read has your name in it. It talks about “Trump remaking the playbook.”
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that’s a positive thing, because that’s an exercise in how to do it and what to do. And that’s good for the future. People can learn from that. But I want the men and women of this country that are in danger — the admirals and the generals that have done a job like they’ve never done before. They’re in war. We’re in war. You know, I call it the “invisible enemy.” That’s the war, and it’s a dangerous war.
We’re also at a level when you said “40,000 people” — and you’re right: almost 40,000 people. And —
Q More than.
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, “more than.” Okay, good. Correct me.
Q We’re at 41,000.
THE PRESIDENT: Good. Well, I’m really glad you corrected me, CNN.
But here’s the story. Let me just tell you something: If we didn’t do what we did, the 40,000 right now could be a million people. It could be a million people, not 40,000. It could be a million.
We’re tracking at much less than the lowest possible estimate. And that’s a great tribute to a number of people and a number of things. One of the things that it’s a tribute to is what’s taken place in this country with the American people, because they’ve gone inside. They’ve done it. They’ve done a job that nobody thought was possible.
And, in fact, when they did the models, as they call them, nobody thought it was possible. They did models not based on this kind of success.
I’ve seen New York streets, and I see it in the morning — I’ve watched, all my life, New York streets — and you can’t even see the pavement, there’s so many people. And you take a look this morning; you take a look — even on Friday morning, I looked at it, I saw it through a camera — there wasn’t a person on Fifth Avenue; there wasn’t a person on Madison Avenue. I’ve never seen anything like it. Because people have really listened to instructions, and they’ve listened to what we’ve had to say — and the professionals. They’ve listened.
And those people — people should really give them a lot of credit, including people like you, because you just don’t have the sense to understand what’s going on.
All right. Yeah, please. Go ahead.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. Should publicly traded companies like Shake Shack and Quantum Corp and Ruth’s Chris — should they have access to the PPP program?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it would depend. It would depend. A lot of those — I don’t know much about any of those companies, but a lot of times, they’re owned by franchisees where they own one or two places, and, you know, they are small businesses. So a lot of that would — that would depend on what the formula is.
But again, many of those companies are — you know, they’re out — they’re franchisees. A franchisee could open up one of the places that you mentioned. And so, yeah, I would say that’s important, actually. That’s like a restaurant.
Go ahead, please.
Q You know, these — you referred to these protests earlier. You know, some of them are getting pretty intense and were actually getting some death threats to some governors who are reluctant to reopen.
THE PRESIDENT: You are, in the media?
Q No, the governors are getting death threats. You know, governors of Kentucky, Michigan, Virginia. They’re getting increased level of death threats. And are you concerned that your talk about liberation and the Second Amendment and all this stuff —
THE PRESIDENT: No. No, no.
Q — are you inciting violence among a few people who are (inaudible)?
THE PRESIDENT: I’ve seen the people. I’ve seen interviews of the people. These are great people. Look, they want to get — they call it “cabin fever.” You’ve heard the term. They’ve got cabin fever. They want to get back. They want their life back. Their life was taken away from them.
And, you know, they learned a lot during this period. They learned to do things differently than they have in the past, and, you know, they’ll do it hopefully until the virus has passed. And when the virus passes, I hope we’re going to be sitting next to each other in baseball games, football games, basketball games, ice hockey games. I hope we’re going to be sitting next to each other. I hope you have golf tourn- — the Masters is going to have 100,000 people, not 25 people watching at the course.
Q Are worried about violence though? I mean, some of them (inaudible) threats at them.
THE PRESIDENT: I am not. No, I’m not. I think these people are — I’ve never seen so many American flags. I mean, I’m seeing the same thing that you’re seeing. I don’t see it any differently.
Q There are Nazi flags out there too.
THE PRESIDENT: They are who?
Q Nazis flags.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that I totally would say, “No way.” But I’ve seen — I didn’t see that. I see all — of course, I’m sure the news plays that up. I’ve seen American flags all over the place. I have never seen so many American flags at a rally as I have at these rallies. These people love our country. They want to get back to work.
Q Mr. President —
THE PRESIDENT: Please. Go ahead.
Q Have you thought any more about pardoning Paul Manafort or Roger Stone so they’re not exposed to coronavirus in jail?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I’ll just tell you this: Roger Stone was treated very unfairly. Paul Manafort — the black book turned out to be a fraud. We learned that out during the various last number of weeks and months. They had a black book that came out of Ukraine. It turned out to be a fraud. It turned out to be a fraud. They convicted a man; it turned out to be a fraud.
General Flynn was a highly respected person, and it turned out to be a scam on him. The FBI said he didn’t lie. And Mueller’s people wanted him to go to jail. Okay?
Q So why not issue a pardon?
THE PRESIDENT: So what am I going to do? You’ll find out what I’m going do. I’m not going to say what I’m going to do.
But I will tell you, the whole thing turned out to be a scam, and it turned out to be a disgrace to our country, and it was a takedown of a duly elected president.
And these people suffered greatly. General Flynn — I mean, what they did to him. And even the FBI said — and they had some — and nobody a bigger fan of the FBI than me, at the level of the people that really matter. But the top of the FBI was scum.
And what they did to General Flynn — and you know it, and everybody knows it — was a disgrace. He was in the service for over 30 years. He ends up being a general and respected. Respected. And almost his first day in office, they come in with papers; they want to investigate him. It never happened before. And now the tables are turned. Investigate the investigators, I guess.
These were crooked people. These are bad people. These are very dangerous people. You know what they are though? They’re scum. They’re human scum.
All right. Do you want to have one? In the back, please.
Q Yes, please. Thank you, Mr. President. The CDC has finally admitted to profound failures with testing kits from the beginning of the outbreak. Is this a function of lax oversight from the Obama-Biden administration?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, it’s not from me. I mean, they came in and they had some problems early on, but we’ve straightened it out. But yeah. I mean, look, I told you we inherited a lot of garbage. We took — they had tests that were no good. They had — all of this stuff was no good. It came from somewhere, so whoever — whoever came up with it.
But I’m proud to tell you that now we went from having a lot of bad things happening in CDC, to having great things happening where they’re doing a very good job now.
But, no, initially — look, our stockpiles were empty. We had horrible stockpiles. We had horrible ventilators. We had very few of them, too. And so did the states have very few of them.
But all of these things are — now we’re at a level that we’ve never been. The same with our military. Our military is the strongest it’s ever been. We spent one and a half trillion dollars on our military. We’ve totally rebuilt our military. It’s never been in a position. We even have Space Force. Mike and I were talking about what an achievement that is. The first time in 72 years, we have a new force.
So, yeah, CDC had obsolete tests, old tests, broken tests, and a mess. But they’ve — they’ve done a very good job. And they’ve done it under pressure. The pressure is, you know, this — they had to do this under pressure. So we’re very proud of the job they’ve done.
{snip}
Q On President Xi, you now talk about the missteps that China made early on in this crisis and how it put you — put the United States behind the curve.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, based on an investigation. We’re going to find out, yeah. Sure.
Q So when you repeatedly praised Xi in January and February —
THE PRESIDENT: Oh, this guy doesn’t stop.
Q — you said he will “solve the problem.” You said he was doing a “great job.” Were you duped by President Xi?
THE PRESIDENT: No, no, no, no. I made a deal that’s phenomenal for the United States. No, you know who was duped? You —
Q This is after the deal.
THE PRESIDENT: You and the Obama administration were duped for years because China was ripping off this country. Like in the history of any country, nobody has been ripped off like the United States by China — and many other countries. And we stop it. And we’ve done —
Q (Inaudible) why you praised him at the time?
THE PRESIDENT: And we’ve done — we’ve done a deal where they’re paying us 250 — they are buying 250 — they didn’t do anything for us. You know, we didn’t even have a deal. It was so bad —
Q This is after the deal. These comments are after the deal.
THE PRESIDENT: No, no. No, no. It’s — it is about a deal, because the deal started a long time ago, before anybody heard about this. The deal was finished a number of months ago. Very happy — I was very happy. I hope they were happy.
Billions of dollars came in, in tariffs. Billions of dollars. They’re going to be purchasing billions. And then, all of a sudden, long after that, I find out about this.
And I told you —
Q Right. But why, on February 23rd —
THE PRESIDENT: I told you I’m not —
Q — did you say, “I think he’s doing a very good job —
THE PRESIDENT: Listen. Listen, CNN.
Q — it’s a big problem, but” —
THE PRESIDENT: Listen, CNN. I told you I’m not happy about it. And this was after the deal. So we have this wonderful deal. And I was very — nobody has been tougher before the deal ever, on China, than Trump. Then I made a deal. I was very happy with the deal. It’s a great deal. Great for our farmers. The farmers have been paid a fortune already. Then what happened —
Q Was it a mistake to take his word for it?
THE PRESIDENT: Then what happened — no mistake. We made a great deal.
Now I find out after the deal — after the deal, not — after the deal —
Q Right. I’m talking about February 23rd.
THE PRESIDENT: I find out that I’m not happy — you people are so pathetic at CNN. Let me just tell you —
Q I have the quote here from February 23rd.
THE PRESIDENT: Sure. I was very happy with the deal, very happy with everything. Then we find out about the plague, right? The plague. And since we found out about that, I’m not happy.
But I closed it up long before Pelosi —
Q Right. This is after the —
THE PRESIDENT: Listen. Long before Pelosi. You know, she was having parties in San Francisco. “Let’s all go to Chinatown.” And that was a long time after the first —
Q This was after the travel restriction, sir. This was on February 23rd.
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead, please.
Q The first — the first of the month is next week —
THE PRESIDENT: That’s why your ratings are so bad, because you’re pathetic.
Go ahead. Let’s go.
Q I’m reading you your quote, sir.
THE PRESIDENT: Your ratings are terrible. You got to get back to real news.
{snip}
Q Mr. President, on state responsibility —
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead. In the back. You didn’t go. Go ahead.
Q Mr. President, thank you very much.
THE PRESIDENT: Who are you with?
Q I’m with the Salt Lake Tribune.
THE PRESIDENT: Okay. Good.
Q Thank you, sir. On Thursday, the White House announced a congressional task force for reopening America. It included every Republican senator but Mitt Romney.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah.
Q Does that show that you’re still holding a grudge against Mitt Romney?
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, it does. Yeah. No, I’m not a fan of Mitt Romney at all. No, I had 52 Republican senators.
Q He was a governor. You don’t want his advice?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I just don’t think — you know, I’m not a fan of Mitt Romney. I don’t really want his advice.
Go ahead, please.
Q Mr. President, why on that task force did you include Senator Kelly Loeffler? There’s some questions about whether she may have —
THE PRESIDENT: Well, because she’s the senator from a great state, a state that I love: Georgia.
Q But there’s some insider trading issues with her.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I — that, I don’t know. I really don’t know about that. But she’s a senator from Georgia, and she was included in the list, absolutely.
{snip}
Thank you all very much. We appreciate it. We’ll see you tomorrow. Thank you.
END 7:57 P.M. EDT
