Vice President Mike Pence told Fox News’s Sean Hannity on Wednesday night that when the coronavirus pandemic is over that the Trump administration will hold the World Health Organization accountable for its actions during the pandemic.
“The president talked yesterday about withholding monies for the WHO after they basically unchecked to spread Chinese propaganda as it relates to the virus. The comments earlier today were if you don’t want many more body bags, you should reframe from politicizing it,” Hannity said. “There’s no need to use COVID to score political points. We need to behave. That’s how we’ll defeat this virus, no need to point fingers.”
“Well, that’s nice that they’re on the attack, but the reality and the truth is — is they didn’t verify a thing and they went forward with false information,” Hannity continued. “And as that one British study said, 95 percent of this could have been prevented had in fact China opened themselves up to the world for help and assistance for early mitigation. And yet, the WHO, which we fund the vast majority of, they didn’t do their job on any level.”
“Well, you know this is a president who believes in accountability, and the American taxpayers provide tens of millions of dollars to the World Health Organization,” Pence responded.
“As the president said yesterday, I expect we’ll continue to do that. But that doesn’t mean that at the right time in the future we aren’t going to ask the tough questions about how the World Health Organization could have been so wrong,” Pence continued. “I mean literally at the time that President Trump set up the White House coronavirus task force in January and suspended all travel from China, just days before that the World Health Organization was continuing to diminish the threat of the coronavirus and its impact in China.”
Pence concluded, “We’ll get to the answers of that, and we’ll create accountability, just like the American people would want us to do.”
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TRANSCRIPT:
SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS HOST: Vice President Pence, thank you for joining us. Glad you could be here. You spoke to —
MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Thank you, Sean.
HANNITY: — Republicans and Democrats today, and what is the plan now? What is your main focus at this point?
PENCE: Well the focus today, as President Trump has made clear from the beginning, is to continue to engage every American to do their part to slow the spread. And it really is inspiring to see the way the American people have stepped up and put into practice the social distancing guidelines.
Everything from personal hygiene, to staying home from work if you can, avoiding unnecessary travel, but staying away from groups of more than 10 people, using drive-thrus at restaurants.
I mean, what we’ve seen in terms of progress in California and Washington, where the numbers remain low and steady — and what we’re just beginning to see in the greater New York City area, and of course New Jersey, and Connecticut, and Louisiana, is evidence of the beginning of a stabilization, which is a great credit to the people of all the states that I mentioned.
But as we made clear to those members of Congress in both parties today, we need every American to continue to do their part. And we will hasten the day that we put the coronavirus in the past, but it’s going to take all of us to do it.
And the good news is, Sean, all evidence suggests that the American people are doing just that. They know our future is in our hands. And as we put the president’s coronavirus guidelines into practice, we’ll get there.
HANNITY: Tell us what you envision for May 1st. We have a $2.2 trillion relief package. We opened up the Fed for another $4 trillion in loans. I know some conservatives were a little nervous about another $2 trillion for infrastructure.
But what does May 1st look like in your mind in terms of opening up the country for business again? How does that work?
PENCE: Well we’re 22 days away from the 30 days that President Trump asked the American people to work together to slow the spread. And what I can tell your viewers is that we will follow the data very carefully.
And while it’s just the beginning, we are seeing evidence that in the areas most challenged — and we grieve the loss of life in New York City that was reported yesterday. We grieve all the families that have lost loved ones. But while we grieve, we don’t grieve like those who have no hope.
And some of these – what we’ve seen in California and Washington state, and what we’re beginning to see in New York, and New Jersey, and Louisiana and elsewhere is evidence of stabilization.
I think the American people can be encouraged if we all continue to do our part, we could be in a very different place by the end of April, and we could be able to come to the president to work with governors to look for ways in — in weeks, not months to begin to, as the president says, to reopen America, to reopen this economy.
HANNITY: The president talked yesterday about withholding monies for the WHO after they basically unchecked to spread Chinese propaganda as it relates to the virus. The comments earlier today were if you don’t want many more body bags you should reframe from politicizing it.
There’s no need to use COVID to score political points. We need to behave. That’s how we’ll defeat this virus, no need to point fingers.
Well, that’s nice that they’re on the attack, but the reality and the truth is — is they didn’t verify a thing and they went forward with false information. And as that one British study said, 95 percent of this could have been prevented had in fact China opened themselves up to the world for help and assistance for early mitigation.
And yet, the WHO, which we fund the fast majority of, they didn’t do their job on any level.
PENCE: Well, you know this is a president who believes in accountability, and the American tax payers provide tens of millions of dollars to the World Health Organization.
As the president said yesterday, I expect we’ll continue to do that. But that doesn’t mean that at the right time in the future we aren’t going to ask the tough questions about how the World Health Organization could have been so wrong.
I mean literally at the time that President Trump stood up the White House coronavirus task force in January and suspended all travel from China, just days before that the World Health Organization was continuing to diminish the threat of the coronavirus and its impact in China.
We’ll get to the answers of that, and we’ll create accountability just like the American people would want us to do.
But what I can assure you is that what President Trump has this team doing everyday, getting up early, staying up late, is making sure that the American people know that what — what every single person in this country can do to slow the spread, to put — go to coronavirus.gov to put those guidelines into practice in your family, in your community.
And he has directed to spare no expense to make sure that we have the broadest amount of testing available, new testing developed, and that most importantly our healthcare workers in America have the resources, the protective equipment, the ventilators to be able to provide the level of care to people that are struggling with the coronavirus.
HANNITY: Do you think the country will be up and running on May 1st, one. And number two, 2.2 trillion, 4 trillion made available by the Fed. There’s talk of another 2 trillion. Do you worry about the sheer amount of money that we’re talking about, unprecedented amounts of money?
PENCE: Well, America is the strongest most prosperous nation in the history of the world. And as we reflected on with members of Congress in both parties today, President Trump is truly grateful.
Then in three different pieces of legislation we’ve demonstrated that we’re going to do whatever it takes to get American families, American small businesses and critical American industries through this challenging time.
But as in terms of when we can reopen America, I would just say to you I wouldn’t speculate on a date, but I can assure you that that’s in the hands of the American people. If every one of us will continue to do and implement the president’s coronavirus guidelines for America, if everyone will continue to put into practice all the things that you’ve — that you’ve been articulating on your program everyday, we’ll continue to save lives, and we’ll reach that day much sooner than people — people thought in the beginning of this outbreak.
HANNITY: All right. Mr. Vice President, as always, thank you for taking time out of your busy day. And obviously these — these press briefings everyday, taking a lot of time, a lot going on behind the scenes.
We appreciate you being with us. Thank you, sir.
PENCE: Thank you, Sean.