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Press Briefing by Kayleigh McEnany; Friday, May 22, 2020
PRESS BRIEFINGS
Press Briefing by Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany
Issued on: May 23, 2020
SHARE:
James S. Brady Press Briefing Room
May 22, 2020
1:48 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. At my direction, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is issuing guidance for communities of faith. I want to thank Dr. Redfield and the CDC for their work on this matter and all the other work they’ve been doing over the past what now seems like a long period of time.
Today, I’m identifying houses of worship — churches, synagogue, and mosques — as essential places that provide essential services.
Some governors have deemed liquor stores and abortion clinics as essential but have left out churches and other houses of worship. It’s not right. So I’m correcting this injustice and calling houses of worship essential.
I call upon governors to allow our churches and places of worship to open right now. If there’s any question, they’re going to have to call me, but they’re not going to be successful in that call.
These are places that hold our society together and keep our people united. The people are demanding to go to church and synagogue, go to their mosque. Many millions of Americans embrace worship as an essential part of life.
The ministers, pastors, rabbis, imams, and other faith leaders will make sure that their congregations are safe as they gather and pray. I know them well. They love their congregations. They love their people. They don’t want anything bad to happen to them or to anybody else.
The governors need to do the right thing and allow these very important, essential places of faith to open right now, for this weekend. If they don’t do it, I will override the governors. In America, we need more prayer, not less.
Thank you very much. Thank you.
MS. MCENANY: All right, everyone. It’s a pleasure to join you today. That was a great announcement from President Trump. I’d like to introduce Dr. Birx right now. She has a wonderful presentation pursuant to reopening America, and some great data to share with you.
So I’ll let her kick this off.
R. BIRX: Thank you, Kayleigh. If we can have the first slide, please.
{snip}
Q Dr. Birx?
Q Dr. Birx?
MS. MCENANY: One more for Dr. Birx. Jon.
Q Dr. Birx, could you — could you comment on the latest study on hydroxychloroquine? There’s this Lancet study that suggests, again, that the drug could cause heart problems and even increased mortality. The President has obviously said that he’s been taking it. What’s your recommendation? And what’s your recommendation on using that drug as a prophylactic?
DR. BIRX: Well, first, I think the FDA has been very clear on their website about their concerns about hydroxychloroquine, particularly when it’s combined with a macrolide. And I think you see that in the study, and I think the study — although it is open label and it is — I tell you what I take home from the Lancet study, and I hope everyone here does, in addition to what you just commented on: It clearly shows that comorbidity that puts individuals at more risk.
And I think it’s one of our clearest study, because there were so many thousands — tens of thousands of individuals involved, that the doctors clearly annotated who had heart disease and who had obesity. And you can see dramatically the increased risk for that.
There are still controlled trials going on, both for prophylaxis and pre-exposure prophylaxis, and as well as controlled trials looking at, in a hospital setting, how these drugs do. And I think those are still pending. But I hope everyone looks at those comorbidities.
{snip}
MS. MCENANY:
{snip}
And finally, before getting started, I wanted to note that the President, as you all are well aware, donates his salary to various initiatives and parts across the federal government. And this quarter he will be donating his salary to HHS, Health and Human Services, to develop new therapies for treating and preventing COVID-19 so that we can safely reopen.
Here’s the check, amounted to $100,000 that will go directly from President Trump and his paycheck that he does not take, but rather donates it to various noble initiatives, including – in honor of COVID this time, and those who have passed and the studies underway, he’ll be donating it to HHS.
And with that, I will take questions from you all.
{snip}
Q Kayleigh?
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q Kayleigh, a couple of questions to follow up on the President’s announcement. First, just to clarify, he came out and said, “I’m calling upon governors to allow churches and places of worship to open up right now.” Dr. Birx just said in areas where they have high cases of COVID-19, maybe they should think about waiting a week. So which is it? And why the mixed messaging?
MS. MCENANY: That’s up to the governors. As it said in our guidance, we note that while many types of gatherings are important for civic and economic wellbeing, religious worship has particularly profound significance to communities and individuals, including as a right protected by the First Amendment.
The President wants to see these communities open. Dr. Birx was integral to making these guidelines, and they lay out a pretty clear path for faith communities to reopen.
Q But, Kayleigh, the President said he’s going to override the governors. Under what authority would he do that? And to your point, he said, several weeks ago, this is all up to the governors.
MS. MCENANY: Well, I think you’re posing a hypothetical. And I think we can all hope that we see governors —
Q No, he said he would override the governors.
MS. MCENANY: You’re posing a hypothetical though. You’re assuming that governors are going to keep churches shut down, and keep mosques shut down, and keep synagogues shut down. That is a hypothetical question, and we will leave it to those faith communities to reopen.
Q The President stood there and said if governors don’t listen to him, he’s going to override their authority.
MS. MCENANY: And, Kristen, I think we can all — we can all hope that, this Sunday, people are allowed to pray to their gods across this country. That’s a good thing.
Q But what authority would he use to override governors?
MS. MCENANY: And I’d also note there’s detailed guidance in here about the way that you can clean your facilities, promote social distancing. So this is something that we should all look at and be thankful that we are encouraging these faith communities to reopen and do so in a safe way. And we’ll leave it to parishes to open in a safe fashion.
Q But just what authority was the President referencing?
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q Kayleigh, does the White House now support these churches that are defying governors’ orders and opening up?
MS. MCENANY: The President has been very clear he wants churches to reopen. He wants them to do it safely. He wants them to do it in accordance with our guidance. It’s laid out and very detailed. It’s posted now, so you can all take a look through it. And he wants to see all of those churches open in a safe fashion.
Q But if a governor does not allow that, does the White House support churches defying these executive orders?
MS. MCENANY: The President has been very clear he wants to see churches reopen in accordance with his guidelines.
Q So the answer is yes?
MS. MCENANY: I just gave you an answer. The President would like churches to reopen and do it in accordance with the guidelines.
Q But just to follow up what Kristen asked, what specific provision of federal law allows the President to override a governor’s decision?
MS. MCENANY: The President will strongly encourage every governor to allow their churches to reopen. And, boy, it’s interesting to be in a room that desperately wants to seem to see these churches and houses of worship stay closed.
Q No, but the President said that he has that authority.
MS. MCENANY: Yes, Jeff.
Q Kayleigh, I object to that. I mean, I go to church. I’m dying to go back to church. The question that we’re asking you and would like to have asked the President and Dr. Birx is: Is it safe? And if it’s not safe, is the President trying to encourage that, or does the President agree with Dr. Birx that people should wait?
MS. MCENANY: Jeff, it is safe to reopen your churches if you do so in accordance with the guidelines, which are laid out in very stringent detail here about promoting hygiene practices — and there are five bullet points — and cloth face coverings, if social distancing is not possible. It’s recommended intensifying cleanings, promoting social distance. We lay them out meticulously.
So I am thankful that we have a President that celebrates the First Amendment. The same amendment that gives you all the ability to ask me questions is there to have the freedom of worship so imams and pastors can go to their churches, can go to their places of worship, and can celebrate what is a First Amendment right in this country, which is to pray to your God and to practice your faith.
Chanel.
Q And we celebrate that too. I just want to follow up by saying: We celebrate that too. Certainly First Amendment, but we’re not — but were not asking —
MS. MCENANY: And so we should be thankful that there are guidelines to allow us to reengage in that behavior.
Q We’re not asking you if the President or people are allowing Americans to pray. That’s not the question that people are asking here.
MS. MCENANY: To gather in their places of worship, to attend church services, to pray together. And the President has laid out a clear path. The CDC has laid out a clear path for this to take place, for our First Amendment to be exercised in a way that is safe and robust. And that is something that is a good thing, and I’m thankful that we have a President who celebrates the First Amendment and helps it to be celebrated in its fullest and most robust way possible.
Chanel.
Q Thank you, Kayleigh. I’d like to switch gears, asking about President Obama. We had a — does the President — would — we had an interesting article from Joel Pollak this morning. And I would like to ask you if the President has considered pardoning President Obama for illegally wiretapping on Trump Towers, illegally spying on U.S. citizens, and other potential crimes out there. Has he considered that?
MS. MCENANY: So I have not spoken to the President about that. But who I did speak to about President Obama and unmasking Michael Flynn were the men and women in this room. I haven’t spoken to him on that specific point. I have spoken to him about the matter generally. And I laid out a series of questions that any good journalist would want to answer about why people were unmasked, and all sorts of questions.
And I just wanted to follow up with you guys on that. Did anyone take it upon themselves to pose any questions about Michael Flynn and unmasking the President Obama spokesperson?
Oh, not a single journalist has posed that question. Okay.
Q But Michael Flynn’s named wasn’t masked.
MS. MCENANY: So I would like to —
Q Kayleigh. Kayleigh.
MS. MCENANY: — lay out a series of questions and perhaps, if I write them out in a slide format — maybe we’re visual learners and you guys will follow up with journalistic curiosity.
So, number one, why did the Obama administration use opposition research, funded by a political organization and filled with foreign dirt, to surveil members of the Trump campaign?
Number two, why was Lieutenant General Michael Flynn unmasked — not by the intel community entirely, but by Obama’s chief of staff; by the former Vice President, Joe Biden; by Susan Rice; by the Treasury Secretary? I mean, this is extraordinary. And, you know, if they were political appointees in the Trump administration, I can guarantee you I’d have questions in my inbox right now, but apparently Obama’s spokesperson does not.
Why was Flynn’s identity leaked in a criminal act? It is a criminal act to leak the identity of Michael Flynn to the press, but it happened. Where are the questions to Obama’s spokesperson? Because my team would be running around this building should this have happened under the Trump administration.
Why did the DOJ, Sally Yates, learn about the unmasking from President Obama? So much for going by the book, as Susan Rice said three times. “Thou doth protest too much,” Susan Rice.
And then, finally, question number five: Why did James Clapper, John Brennan, Samantha Power, and Susan Rice privately admit under oath they had no evidence of collusion, while saying the opposite publicly?
It’s a long weekend. You guys have three days to follow up on those questions. And I certainly hope the next time I ask, some hands go up, because Obama’s spokesperson should be asked those questions because President Trump’s spokespeople certainly would be.
END 2:29 P.M. EDT
Press Briefing by Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany
Issued on: May 23, 2020
SHARE:
James S. Brady Press Briefing Room
May 22, 2020
1:48 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. At my direction, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is issuing guidance for communities of faith. I want to thank Dr. Redfield and the CDC for their work on this matter and all the other work they’ve been doing over the past what now seems like a long period of time.
Today, I’m identifying houses of worship — churches, synagogue, and mosques — as essential places that provide essential services.
Some governors have deemed liquor stores and abortion clinics as essential but have left out churches and other houses of worship. It’s not right. So I’m correcting this injustice and calling houses of worship essential.
I call upon governors to allow our churches and places of worship to open right now. If there’s any question, they’re going to have to call me, but they’re not going to be successful in that call.
These are places that hold our society together and keep our people united. The people are demanding to go to church and synagogue, go to their mosque. Many millions of Americans embrace worship as an essential part of life.
The ministers, pastors, rabbis, imams, and other faith leaders will make sure that their congregations are safe as they gather and pray. I know them well. They love their congregations. They love their people. They don’t want anything bad to happen to them or to anybody else.
The governors need to do the right thing and allow these very important, essential places of faith to open right now, for this weekend. If they don’t do it, I will override the governors. In America, we need more prayer, not less.
Thank you very much. Thank you.
MS. MCENANY: All right, everyone. It’s a pleasure to join you today. That was a great announcement from President Trump. I’d like to introduce Dr. Birx right now. She has a wonderful presentation pursuant to reopening America, and some great data to share with you.
So I’ll let her kick this off.
R. BIRX: Thank you, Kayleigh. If we can have the first slide, please.
{snip}
Q Dr. Birx?
Q Dr. Birx?
MS. MCENANY: One more for Dr. Birx. Jon.
Q Dr. Birx, could you — could you comment on the latest study on hydroxychloroquine? There’s this Lancet study that suggests, again, that the drug could cause heart problems and even increased mortality. The President has obviously said that he’s been taking it. What’s your recommendation? And what’s your recommendation on using that drug as a prophylactic?
DR. BIRX: Well, first, I think the FDA has been very clear on their website about their concerns about hydroxychloroquine, particularly when it’s combined with a macrolide. And I think you see that in the study, and I think the study — although it is open label and it is — I tell you what I take home from the Lancet study, and I hope everyone here does, in addition to what you just commented on: It clearly shows that comorbidity that puts individuals at more risk.
And I think it’s one of our clearest study, because there were so many thousands — tens of thousands of individuals involved, that the doctors clearly annotated who had heart disease and who had obesity. And you can see dramatically the increased risk for that.
There are still controlled trials going on, both for prophylaxis and pre-exposure prophylaxis, and as well as controlled trials looking at, in a hospital setting, how these drugs do. And I think those are still pending. But I hope everyone looks at those comorbidities.
{snip}
MS. MCENANY:
{snip}
And finally, before getting started, I wanted to note that the President, as you all are well aware, donates his salary to various initiatives and parts across the federal government. And this quarter he will be donating his salary to HHS, Health and Human Services, to develop new therapies for treating and preventing COVID-19 so that we can safely reopen.
Here’s the check, amounted to $100,000 that will go directly from President Trump and his paycheck that he does not take, but rather donates it to various noble initiatives, including – in honor of COVID this time, and those who have passed and the studies underway, he’ll be donating it to HHS.
And with that, I will take questions from you all.
{snip}
Q Kayleigh?
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q Kayleigh, a couple of questions to follow up on the President’s announcement. First, just to clarify, he came out and said, “I’m calling upon governors to allow churches and places of worship to open up right now.” Dr. Birx just said in areas where they have high cases of COVID-19, maybe they should think about waiting a week. So which is it? And why the mixed messaging?
MS. MCENANY: That’s up to the governors. As it said in our guidance, we note that while many types of gatherings are important for civic and economic wellbeing, religious worship has particularly profound significance to communities and individuals, including as a right protected by the First Amendment.
The President wants to see these communities open. Dr. Birx was integral to making these guidelines, and they lay out a pretty clear path for faith communities to reopen.
Q But, Kayleigh, the President said he’s going to override the governors. Under what authority would he do that? And to your point, he said, several weeks ago, this is all up to the governors.
MS. MCENANY: Well, I think you’re posing a hypothetical. And I think we can all hope that we see governors —
Q No, he said he would override the governors.
MS. MCENANY: You’re posing a hypothetical though. You’re assuming that governors are going to keep churches shut down, and keep mosques shut down, and keep synagogues shut down. That is a hypothetical question, and we will leave it to those faith communities to reopen.
Q The President stood there and said if governors don’t listen to him, he’s going to override their authority.
MS. MCENANY: And, Kristen, I think we can all — we can all hope that, this Sunday, people are allowed to pray to their gods across this country. That’s a good thing.
Q But what authority would he use to override governors?
MS. MCENANY: And I’d also note there’s detailed guidance in here about the way that you can clean your facilities, promote social distancing. So this is something that we should all look at and be thankful that we are encouraging these faith communities to reopen and do so in a safe way. And we’ll leave it to parishes to open in a safe fashion.
Q But just what authority was the President referencing?
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q Kayleigh, does the White House now support these churches that are defying governors’ orders and opening up?
MS. MCENANY: The President has been very clear he wants churches to reopen. He wants them to do it safely. He wants them to do it in accordance with our guidance. It’s laid out and very detailed. It’s posted now, so you can all take a look through it. And he wants to see all of those churches open in a safe fashion.
Q But if a governor does not allow that, does the White House support churches defying these executive orders?
MS. MCENANY: The President has been very clear he wants to see churches reopen in accordance with his guidelines.
Q So the answer is yes?
MS. MCENANY: I just gave you an answer. The President would like churches to reopen and do it in accordance with the guidelines.
Q But just to follow up what Kristen asked, what specific provision of federal law allows the President to override a governor’s decision?
MS. MCENANY: The President will strongly encourage every governor to allow their churches to reopen. And, boy, it’s interesting to be in a room that desperately wants to seem to see these churches and houses of worship stay closed.
Q No, but the President said that he has that authority.
MS. MCENANY: Yes, Jeff.
Q Kayleigh, I object to that. I mean, I go to church. I’m dying to go back to church. The question that we’re asking you and would like to have asked the President and Dr. Birx is: Is it safe? And if it’s not safe, is the President trying to encourage that, or does the President agree with Dr. Birx that people should wait?
MS. MCENANY: Jeff, it is safe to reopen your churches if you do so in accordance with the guidelines, which are laid out in very stringent detail here about promoting hygiene practices — and there are five bullet points — and cloth face coverings, if social distancing is not possible. It’s recommended intensifying cleanings, promoting social distance. We lay them out meticulously.
So I am thankful that we have a President that celebrates the First Amendment. The same amendment that gives you all the ability to ask me questions is there to have the freedom of worship so imams and pastors can go to their churches, can go to their places of worship, and can celebrate what is a First Amendment right in this country, which is to pray to your God and to practice your faith.
Chanel.
Q And we celebrate that too. I just want to follow up by saying: We celebrate that too. Certainly First Amendment, but we’re not — but were not asking —
MS. MCENANY: And so we should be thankful that there are guidelines to allow us to reengage in that behavior.
Q We’re not asking you if the President or people are allowing Americans to pray. That’s not the question that people are asking here.
MS. MCENANY: To gather in their places of worship, to attend church services, to pray together. And the President has laid out a clear path. The CDC has laid out a clear path for this to take place, for our First Amendment to be exercised in a way that is safe and robust. And that is something that is a good thing, and I’m thankful that we have a President who celebrates the First Amendment and helps it to be celebrated in its fullest and most robust way possible.
Chanel.
Q Thank you, Kayleigh. I’d like to switch gears, asking about President Obama. We had a — does the President — would — we had an interesting article from Joel Pollak this morning. And I would like to ask you if the President has considered pardoning President Obama for illegally wiretapping on Trump Towers, illegally spying on U.S. citizens, and other potential crimes out there. Has he considered that?
MS. MCENANY: So I have not spoken to the President about that. But who I did speak to about President Obama and unmasking Michael Flynn were the men and women in this room. I haven’t spoken to him on that specific point. I have spoken to him about the matter generally. And I laid out a series of questions that any good journalist would want to answer about why people were unmasked, and all sorts of questions.
And I just wanted to follow up with you guys on that. Did anyone take it upon themselves to pose any questions about Michael Flynn and unmasking the President Obama spokesperson?
Oh, not a single journalist has posed that question. Okay.
Q But Michael Flynn’s named wasn’t masked.
MS. MCENANY: So I would like to —
Q Kayleigh. Kayleigh.
MS. MCENANY: — lay out a series of questions and perhaps, if I write them out in a slide format — maybe we’re visual learners and you guys will follow up with journalistic curiosity.
So, number one, why did the Obama administration use opposition research, funded by a political organization and filled with foreign dirt, to surveil members of the Trump campaign?
Number two, why was Lieutenant General Michael Flynn unmasked — not by the intel community entirely, but by Obama’s chief of staff; by the former Vice President, Joe Biden; by Susan Rice; by the Treasury Secretary? I mean, this is extraordinary. And, you know, if they were political appointees in the Trump administration, I can guarantee you I’d have questions in my inbox right now, but apparently Obama’s spokesperson does not.
Why was Flynn’s identity leaked in a criminal act? It is a criminal act to leak the identity of Michael Flynn to the press, but it happened. Where are the questions to Obama’s spokesperson? Because my team would be running around this building should this have happened under the Trump administration.
Why did the DOJ, Sally Yates, learn about the unmasking from President Obama? So much for going by the book, as Susan Rice said three times. “Thou doth protest too much,” Susan Rice.
And then, finally, question number five: Why did James Clapper, John Brennan, Samantha Power, and Susan Rice privately admit under oath they had no evidence of collusion, while saying the opposite publicly?
It’s a long weekend. You guys have three days to follow up on those questions. And I certainly hope the next time I ask, some hands go up, because Obama’s spokesperson should be asked those questions because President Trump’s spokespeople certainly would be.
END 2:29 P.M. EDT
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