U.S. President Joe Biden promised to vaccinate America and beat COVID-19. That was in January. Since then more than 353,000 Americans have died from COVID-19, more than the 352,000 who died during Trump’s presidency.
So, what went wrong?
Biden blames former President Trump for an initially slow vaccination rollout, vaccine hesitancy and shortfalls initially in vaccine inventory. What Biden doesn’t blame is himself. In the summer of 2020, Biden planted the seeds of vaccine hesitancy in what he labeled the “Trump vaccine”. Today, he’s not only forcing Americans to take the “Trump vaccine”, but he and the Democrat party are also threatening the jobs of those who still fear the “Trump vaccine”, segregating them from the rest of society and keeping them out of restaurants, denying them medical care in hospitals.
In the early days of the COVID-19 vaccine development, Biden told his supporters that he did not trust a “Trump vaccine”. Biden and Harris planted the initial seeds of distrust in a vaccine they are forcing upon the American people.
On July 28th, Biden sowed the initial fear of the COVID-19 vaccine, saying, “How are you going to distribute the vaccine when it arrives, when it arrives, when it’s there? And the question of whether it’s real, when it’s there, that requires enormous transparency. You’ve got to make all of it available to other experts across the nation, so they can look and see, so there’s consensus this is a safe vaccine. Because already you have, what percent is American people saying if the vaccine were there tomorrow, they wouldn’t take it? And it’s not the usual anti-vaccine crowd. It’s beyond that because people are losing faith in what the president says. Think about it.”
On August 6th, 2020, then candidate Joe Biden said he didn’t trust Trump’s vaccination program, “The way he (Trump) talks about the vaccine is not particularly rational. He’s talking about it being ready, he’s going to talk about moving it quicker than the scientists think it should be moved … . People don’t believe that he’s telling the truth, therefore they’re not at all certain they’re going to take the vaccine. And one more thing: If and when the vaccine comes, it’s not likely to go through all the tests that need to be done, and the trials that are needed to be done.”
On September 2nd, he added, “Look at what’s happened. Enormous pressure put on the CDC not to put out the detailed guidelines. The enormous pressure being put on the FDA to say they’re going, that the following protocol will in fact reduce, it will have a giant impact on COVID. All these things turn out not to be true, and when a president continues to mislead and lie, when we finally do, God willing, get a vaccine, who’s going to take the shot? Who’s going to take the shot? You going to be the first one to say, ‘Put me — sign me up, they now say it’s OK’? I’m not being facetious.”
On September 9th, Biden continued casting doubt on Trump’s vaccine program, “Americans have had to endure President Trump’s incompetence and dishonesty when it comes to testing and personal protective equipment. We can’t afford to repeat those fiascos when it comes to a vaccine. … Let me be clear: I trust vaccines, I trust scientists, but I don’t trust Donald Trump, and at this moment, the American people can’t either. Last week, Senator Harris and I laid out three questions this administration’s going to have to answer to assure the American people that politics will not play a role whatsoever in the vaccine process. If Donald Trump can’t give answers and the administration can’t give answers to these three questions, the American people should not have confidence.”
On September 26th Harris was asked if she was going to take the vaccine, she replied, “Well, I think that’s going to be an issue for all of us. I will say that I would not trust Donald Trump. And it would have to be a credible source of information that talks about the efficacy and the reliability of whatever he’s talking about. I will not take his word for it. He wants us to inject bleach. I — no, I will not take his word.”
On October 7th, she doubled down on her distrust of a “Trump vaccine”, saying, “If the public health professionals, if Dr. Fauci, if the doctors tell us that we should take it, I’ll be the first in line to take it. Absolutely. But if Donald Trump tells us that we should take it, I’m not taking it.”
The vaccination rate is slowing down nationwide. Last week there were more booster shots given than first or second doses of the vaccine.
This month, Vox reported the failures of the Biden vaccine program.
“Over the summer, America’s Covid-19 vaccine success story morphed into a tale of mediocrity and missed opportunities — while countries in Western Europe and Scandinavia caught up with, then surpassed, the United States in their vaccination campaigns,” Vox reported.
“We had the lead and then fell behind,” Céline Gounder, an infectious disease epidemiologist, said. “We were quick to vaccinate the half of the population that was eager to be vaccinated but then hit a plateau.”
Somewhere along the line between the political bantering of Trump, Harris, and Biden, Americans became politically polarized when it comes to the vaccine. Trump’s vaccine is now “Biden’s mandate”, leaving many on both sides of the political aisle distrusting of the vaccine.
56% of Republicans are vaccinated and 82% of Democrats are vaccinated according to reported figures. What’s never spoken about is how many independents and unregistered voters are not vaccinated. It’s not just Republicans balking at the vaccine. Many urban blacks and Latino Americans also aren’t getting the vaccine. The 14% of Democrats who are not getting the vaccine may still be in fear of injecting a “Trump vaccine” into their bodies.
The President has done nothing to unite the people of America behind the vaccine or to build trust in the vaccine. Instead, he’s forcing it into their arms, telling them they will lose their jobs if they don’t do it.
The vaccine has morphed from something Americans once boasted about to a government-mandated drug being forced upon the population and it’s not Donad Trump’s fault. Joe Biden owns that.