Pritzker, Trump trade barbs on coronavirus
‘Get off Twitter and do your job,’ says guv as promised federal aid falls short
Vice President Pence and President Trump conduct a recent White House briefing on the coronavirus outbreak. (Official White House Photo/D. Myles Cullen)
By Ted Cox
Gov. J.B. Pritzker is ripping the federal government over its failure to deliver promised medical equipment to deal with the coronavirus crisis, while calling out President Trump for his failure to lead.
Pritzker charged in an appearance on CNN’s Sunday show “State of the Nation” that the federal government was failing to lead in acquiring and distributing personal protective equipment — also known as PPE — to doctors and nurses on the front lines in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.
Calling it “a Wild West out there,” Pritzker said that lack of a centralized response to the crisis translated into states bidding against other states and other nations for equipment ranging from surgical masks to respirators and ventilators.
“This should have been a coordinated effort by the federal government,” he told CNN.
Trump lashed back in his favored manner on Twitter, tweeting, “Governor of Illinois, and a very small group of certain other Governors, together with Fake News @CNN & Concast (MSDNC), shouldn’t be blaming the Federal Government for their own shortcomings. We are there to back you up should you fail, and always will be!”
Pritzker immediately countered: “You wasted precious months when you could’ve taken action to protect Americans and Illinoisans. You should be leading a national response instead of throwing tantrums from the backseat. Where were the tests when we needed them? Where’s the PPE? Get off Twitter and do your job.”
Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot chimed in, tweeting to Trump: “Please step up and be a leader. While you have been yammering about hoaxes and fake news, the COVID-19 pandemic has hit all over America. Gov. Pritzker and others have filled this country’s leadership gap. Lead or get out of their way.”
Later Sunday, the Pritzker administration announced the latest in a series of one-day highs in the number of new COVID-19 cases statewide, with 296 confirmed in what are now 30 counties, including Jo Daviess, Livingston, Rock Island, and Stephenson counties. That pushed the total state count into the thousands at 1,049, with nine deaths attributed to the coronavirus.
Pritzker kept up the criticism Monday with an appearance on NBC’s “Today” show. “We’re competing for ventilators with (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) and the federal government,” he said. “Prices are being ratcheted up, and we’re competing against each other on what should be a national crisis where we should be coming together and the federal government should be leading.”
He called on Trump to invoke the Defense Production Act to seize critical equipment and distribute it where needed. “It allows the federal government to put the United States first,” he said, charging that Trump “signed something, but then he hasn’t actually invoked it.”
Pritzker also called on members of Congress to hold the line on a economic-stimulus bill crafted by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky that includes what critics call a $500 billion “slush fund” for corporations to be meted out by Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin with little if any oversight.
The governor backed the need for another major stimulus package, but quickly added, “The lessons of 2008 need to be learned, though. The money really needs to get in the hands of the middle class, the working class, and people who really need it,” along with the states already working to alleviate the outbreak’s effect on the economy. In the midst of the Great Recession in 2008, the federal government passed bailouts for the financial industry, with few consequences for banks that contributed to the downturn.
“Needlessly handing billions of dollars to companies when you could put it in the hands of average folks or into the hands of states that are providing services seems illogical to me,” Pritzker said.
U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth agreed, issuing a statement from Washington, D.C., saying: “Struggling workers need help today and they deserve to have their jobs protected tomorrow. First responders and hospitals need personal protective equipment and resources immediately. Our nation faces a public health and economic crisis on a scale few if any of us have ever seen before. Instead of doing the right thing, Senate Republicans are pushing to give the Trump administration a Mnuchin-controlled slush fund with virtually no oversight, and using the stock market and American lives as leverage.”
Calling it a “one-sided proposal,” Duckworth added that it “fails to provide enough resources to hospitals that are being slammed, it fails to protect first responders or ensure workplace safety, and it fails to do anything to safeguard jobs for the millions of Americans who are suffering through no fault of their own. The only thing this legislation succeeds in protecting are corporations and (chief executive officers) by ensuring they can continue giving themselves raises and buying back stocks in exchange for this taxpayer-funded bailout. I’m astonished that Mitch McConnell would play with the health and well-being of both the American economy and the American people, and I simply cannot vote for it. Neither should anyone else.”
Later in the day, after Senate Democrats again rejected the McConnell proposal, Duckworth was even more scathing, issuing a statement saying: “Right before Mitch McConnell went to the Senate floor to inaccurately blame Democrats for holding up this critical stimulus over what he feels are unrelated issues, Republicans secretly added a poison pill to their proposal that would punish health-care providers around the country that provide critical services to people with disabilities, the elderly, and even survivors of rape and abuse by denying providers that receive Medicaid funding the same much-needed assistance that other small businesses would receive. This poison pill would mean that seniors could miss out on meal delivery services they need to eat, and people with disabilities could be stranded without the home-care assistance they need to go about their daily lives.
“Mitch McConnell can say whatever he wants, whether it’s true or not, but the reality will not change,” she added. “Democrats are fighting for middle-class families, for gig workers, for jobs, for students, for homeowners, for renters and for those desperately in need of care. Meanwhile, Republicans are taking advantage of a global public health crisis to close health-care centers, to create a Mnuchin-controlled GOP slush fund with virtually no oversight, and to ensure CEOs and corporations like Donald Trump’s can continue buying back stocks and giving themselves unjustifiable raises on the backs of American taxpayers. These efforts by Senate Republicans are unconscionable.”
Pritzker praised residents statewide for their observance of the stay-at-home order he imposed Friday in a measure intended to slow the spread of the disease. He applauded Illinoisans for their volunteerism, specifically citing “people caring for one another in their communities, taking care of the elderly and our first responders.”