- Jen Psaki on Thursday declined to praise the Trump administration for its vaccine implementation.
- “I don’t think anyone deserves credit when half a million people” in the United States died, she said.
- Biden said this week that there would be enough vaccines for every American adult by the end of May.
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White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Thursday refused to praise the Trump administration for its vaccine distribution efforts before President Joe Biden took office.
“I don’t think anyone deserves credit when half a million people in the country died from this pandemic,” Psaki told reporters after she was asked whether the Trump administration should receive praise for its vaccine launch.
Psaki said that when Biden became president, there was a shortage of vaccines, vaccinators and distribution sites that would be needed to keep the COVID-19 pandemic in check.
“There is no doubt and all the data points to the fact that there was not enough of any of these things when he took office,” added Psaki.
Psaki’s comments on Thursday echoed earlier statements by Biden, who called former President Donald Trump’s handling of the public health crisis “even more terrible” than he had predicted. When Trump stepped down, about 400,000 people in the country had died of the virus.
“It was one thing if we had enough vaccine, which we didn’t have, so we are pushing as hard as we can for more vaccines to be made,” said Biden in February.
Biden said this week that the country is on track to ensure sufficient vaccines are provided for every American adult by the end of May.
“When we took office, the previous government had not contracted enough vaccine for adults in America,” said Biden on Tuesday. “Today, we are announcing a major step forward.”
In his last days in office, Trump regularly took credit for the development of two coronavirus vaccines by pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and Moderna. In November, when the vaccines were in the clinical trial stage, Trump was furious at the prospect of Biden being praised for launching the vaccine, the Daily Beast reported.
Biden’s national approval rating is 51%, according to a Monmouth University survey released on Wednesday. As of Thursday, nearly 520,000 people have died of COVID-19 in the United States.