Last updated on September 25th, 2023 at 08:57 pm
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) nailed Trump with his own budget that tried to cut hundreds of millions of dollars from the CDC before the pandemic.
Transcript via Face The Nation:
MARGARET BRENNAN: Did the CDC let the American people down?
REPRESENTATIVE NANCY PELOSI: Well, the CDC was grossly cut in the President’s budget, but setting aside how we got here, let’s talk about how we go forward. It is important for us– the American people want the economy to open up. We all do. We want our societies to– to open up. We all do. And in order to do that, we have testing, tracing, treatment, and isolation. And that is the path. It’s what the scientists advise. That is what we do in the HEROES Act. We talk about how we can get there with a plan. This– we haven’t had a plan. Let’s go forward in a bipartisan way to have a plan, a plan to test.
We have no idea the size of this challenge to our country because we have not sufficiently tested. Let’s test so that we can diagnose and then we can treat and then decrease the number of people who have died. Imagine that ninety thousand Americans, almost ninety thousand Americans have lost this life– their lives, to this awful villain. We, whatever our differences, have to join together to fight this enemy to the lives and the livelihood of the American people. Ninety thousand people, we send our condolences and our prayers to their families. We will always carry them in our hearts.
Video:
WATCH: @SpeakerPelosi calls for a "strategic plan" forward in the fight against #COVID19.
Says @cdcgov was "grossly cut in the president's budget" amid concerns the agency let the public down in the #coronavirus fighthttps://t.co/QxTGpRBSyf pic.twitter.com/8oIJmYENIc
— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) May 17, 2020
Speaker Pelosi was correct. The latest Trump budget proposed a $693 million cut to the CDC. Presidents don’t set the national budget, but their budget submissions are statements of values and priorities.
Trump was trying to cut the CDC before the pandemic hit.
As the Trump administration is attempting to blame the CDC for the pandemic, the facts tell a different story. Donald Trump didn’t treat pandemic preparation as a priority. He was attempting to slash funding to the CDC before the pandemic hit.
Rep. Pelosi saw through the White House spin, and blew it to bits with one important fact.
Trump wanted to cut the CDC.
For more discussion about this story join our Rachel Maddow and MSNBC group.
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Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
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