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Trump's Remarks in Press Briefing; April 14, 2020
REMARKS
Remarks by President Trump in Press Briefing
HEALTHCARE
Issued on: April 14, 2020
Rose Garden
6:14 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Please. Very importantly, Id like to begin by saying that weve just reached agreement the Secretary of Treasury, Steve Mnuchin, with the major airlines, all of our great airlines to participate in a Payroll Support Program. This agreement will fully support airline industry workers, preserve the vital role airlines play in our economy, and protect taxpayers. Our airlines are now in good shape, and they will get over a very tough period of time that was not caused by them.
The United States is continuing to make substantial progress in our war against the virus. We grieve at every precious life that has been lost to the invisible enemy, but through the darkness, we can see the rays of light. We see that tunnel. And at the end of that tunnel, we see light. Were starting to see it.
More than ever before, weve held our rate, the numbers everything weve done. Weve been very, very strong on it and very powerful on it. You look at whats happening in other countries Spain, Italy, United Kingdom. Were working with them. Were trying to help them, especially with ventilators. Theyve been calling a lot. They need ventilators so badly.
Fifteen percent of counties within the United States have zero cases, and many counties within the United States have a very small number of cases. Large sections of our country are really looking at other sections and saying, Wow, that looks bad. But they dont have the problem.
I salute the American people for following our guidelines on social distancing even you people. Its so different looking out there when I look at you. Their devotion, your devotion is saving lives.
Today Im instructing my administration to halt funding of the World Health Organization while a review is conducted to assess the World Health Organizations role in severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus. Everybody knows whats going on there.
American taxpayers provide between $400 million and $500 million per year to the WHO. In contrast, China contributes roughly $40 million a year and even less. As the organizations leading sponsor, the United States has a duty to insist on full accountability.
One of the most dangerous and costly decisions from the WHO was its disastrous decision to oppose travel restrictions from China and other nations. They were very much opposed to what we did. Fortunately, I was not convinced and suspended travel from China, saving untold numbers of lives. Thousands and thousands of people would have died.
Had other nations likewise suspended travel from China, countless more lives would have been saved. Instead, look at the rest of the world. Look at parts of Europe. Other nations and regions, who followed WHO guidelines and kept their borders open to China, accelerated the pandemic all around the world. Many countries said, Were going to listen to the WHO, and they have problems the likes of which they cannot believe. Nobody can believe.
The decision of other major countries to keep travel open was one of the great tragedies and missed opportunities from the early days. The WHOs attack on travel restrictions put political correctness above lifesaving measures. Travel bans work for the same reason that quarantines work. Pandemics depend on human-to-human transmission. Border control is fundamental to virus control.
Since its establishment in 1948, the American people have generously supported the World Health Organization to provide better health outcomes for the world and, most importantly, to help prevent global health crises. With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have deep concerns whether Americas generosity has been put to the best use possible.
The reality is that the WHO failed to adequately obtain that and share information in a timely and transparent fashion.
The world depends on the WHO to work with countries to ensure that accurate information about international health threats is shared in a timely manner, and if its not, to independently to tell the world the truth about what is happening.
The WHO failed in this basic duty and must be held accountable. Its time, after all of these decades. The WHO failed to investigate credible reports from sources in Wuhan that conflicted directly with the Chinese governments official accounts. There was credible information to suspect human-to-human transmission in December 2019, which should have spurred the WHO to investigate, and investigate immediately.
Through the middle of January, it parroted and publicly endorsed the idea that there was not human-to-human transmission happening despite reports and clear evidence to the contrary. The delays the WHO experienced in declaring a public health emergency caused valuable time, tremendous amounts of time. More time was lost in the delay it took to get a team of international experts in to examine the outbreak, which we wanted to do, which they should have done. The inability of the WHO to obtain virus samples, to this date, has deprived the scientific community of essential data.
New data that emerges across the world on a daily basis points to the unreliability of the initial reports, and the world received all sorts of false information about transmission and mortality.
The silence of the WHO on the disappearance of scientific researchers and doctors and on new restrictions on the sharing of research into the origins of COVID-19 in the country of origin is deeply concerning, especially when we put up, by far, the largest amount of money. Not even close.
Had the WHO done its job to get medical experts into China to objectively assess the situation on the ground and to call out Chinas lack of transparency, the outbreak could have been contained at its source, with very little death very little death and certainly very little death by comparison. This would have saved thousands of lives and avoided worldwide economic damage.
Instead, the WHO willingly took Chinas assurances to face value, and they took it just at face value and defended the actions of the Chinese government, even praising China for its so-called transparency. I dont think so. The WHO pushed Chinas misinformation about the virus, saying it was not communicable and there was no need for travel bans. They told us, when we put on our travel ban a very strong travel ban there was no need to do it. Dont do it. They actually fought us.
The WHOs reliance on Chinas disclosures likely caused a 20-fold increase in cases worldwide, and it may be much more than that.
The WHO has not addressed a single one of these concerns nor provided a serious explanation that acknowledges its own mistakes, of which there were many.
America and the world have chosen to rely on the WHO for accurate, timely, and independent information to make important public health recommendations and decisions. If we cannot trust that this is what we will receive from the WHO, our country will be forced to find other ways to work with other nations to achieve public health goals. Well have no choice but to do that.
Our countries are now experiencing you look all over the world tremendous death and economic devastation because those tasked with protecting us by being truthful and transparent failed to do so. It would have been so easy to be truthful. And so much death has been caused by their mistakes.
We will continue to engage with the WHO to see if it can make meaningful reforms. For the time being, we will redirect global health and directly work with others. All of the aid that we send will be discussed at very, very powerful lettel [sic] letters and with very powerful and influential groups and smart groups medically, politically, and every other way.
And well be discussing it with other countries and global health partners: what do we do with all of that money that goes to WHO. And maybe WHO will reform, and maybe they wont. But well be able to see.
As you know, in other countries hit hard by the virus, hospitals have been tragically forced to ration medical care and the use of ventilators. But due to our early and aggressive action, the skill of our healthcare workers, and the resilience of our healthcare system, no hospital in America has been forced to deny any patient access to a ventilator with all of the talk youve heard, where some states wanted 40,000 ventilators. I said, That doesnt work, 40,000. And they ended up with seven or eight thousand, and they had no problem. Forty thousand ventilators for one state is ridiculous.
The scariest day of my life was about a month ago when, after a long day of meetings, my team told me that we were going to be needing 130,000 ventilators; that we were short hundreds of thousands of ventilators. This is the system we inherited. I had governors requesting unreasonable sums that the federal government just didnt have.
And you look at the states. The states didnt have the states were not prepared. I knew that every person who needed a ventilator and didnt get one would die. And thats what we were told: They would die. I saw another countrys doctors having to make decisions on who got a ventilator and who didnt. And I knew that this would be a defining challenge of the crisis. Those that didnt get ventilators were said to be in a position only of one alternative and that was death. Would we be able to prevent Americans from dying because we couldnt get them ventilators and the ventilators that they needed and they needed immediately? I instructed my team to move Heaven and Earth to make sure that this didnt happen.
We started to smartly ration and distribute the ventilators that we had and that others had. And I got daily updates on the supply we had from requests coming in and people wanting to have updates. We had a great group of people working on it.
I instructed my team to use the Defense Production Act. And the Defense Production Act was used very powerfully more powerfully than anybody would know. In fact, so powerfully that, for the most part, we didnt have to officially take it out it was a hammer; it was a very powerful hammer in order to manufacture as many ventilators as possible.
Last year, America manufactured, from a dead start, 30,000 ventilators. And this year, the number will be over 150,000 ventilators. It could be as high as 200,000 far more than well ever need. So well be able to stockpile. Well be able to talk to states about stockpiling.
These are high-quality ventilators. We had a choice: We could do inexpensive, less productive ventilators or high-quality. Weve done a high-quality ventilator.
So we should have anywhere from 150- to 200,000 ventilators. In addition to that, we have 10,000 ventilators right now in the federal stockpile ready to move should we need them we might not should we need them in New York or New Jersey or in Louisiana or in Illinois or any other state that may need them if we have a surge.
Id like to ask Adam Boehler to come up and just say a few words. Hes done a fantastic job a young man who worked 24 hours a day on handling this situation. And Id just like to have have Adam, wherever he may be, come up and say a few words.
Adam, please. Thank you very much.
{snip}
And, with that, if you have a few questions, well take them. And if not, that would be okay too.
{snip}
Q Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, please.
Q Mr. President, you mentioned that youre going to be speaking with the all the governors tomorrow
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
Q make recommendations
THE PRESIDENT: On probably Thursday.
Q On Thursday. What if they dont listen to you or take your advice or obey you?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, listen
Q Will you
THE PRESIDENT: All right.
Q Will you consider taking away their federal funding?
THE PRESIDENT: I dont want to say that. Theyll listen. Theyll be fine. I think were going to have a good relationship. They need the federal government not only for funding and Im not saying take it away but they need it for advice. Theyll need, maybe, equipment that we have. We have a tremendous stockpile that were in the process of completing. Were in a very good position.
Again, the cupboard was bare when I got here. Nobody ever thought a thing in all fairness to previous administrations, nobody ever thought anything like this was going to happen, but it did happen.
No, the governors will be very, very respectful of the presidency. Again, this isnt me; this is the presidency. The presidency has such a great importance, in terms of what were doing. And you can talk about Constitution, you can talk about federalism, you can talk about whatever you want, but the best way Im talking now from a managerial standpoint is to let individual governors run individual states and come to us if they have difficulty and we will help them.
Yeah, John.
{snip}
Q Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead, please.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. You were just criticizing the WHO for praising China as transparent, but you were saying many of the same things about China just a couple of months ago. So, I mean, how do you square, your decision to revoke funding (inaudible)?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I did a trade deal with China, where China is supposed to be spending $250 billion in our country. Were going to be watching very much to see. Now, it got a little bit waylaid by the virus.
But, look, Id love to have a good relationship with China. But if you look and we made a phenomenal deal. China has paid because of me, China has paid us tens of billions of dollars over the course of a very short period of time. Billions of some of that money has been spent to farmers, where they were targeted by China. We cannot let that happen. We cant let that happen.
So we ended up signing a very good trade deal. Now, I want to see if China lives up to it. I know President Xi; I think he will live up to it. If he doesnt live up to it, that will be okay too because we have very, very good alternatives.
Q I was talking about the (inaudible).
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead.
Q Yeah, thank you. Today: 600,000 cases, 25,000 deaths. I know you want to bring blame the WHO, but Ive spoken to hundreds of people across the country in the last few weeks who say they still cant get tested and that they arent social distancing because they saw
THE PRESIDENT: So the governors
Q Wait wait a minute. Let me finish.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Q So they arent
THE PRESIDENT: Excuse me. Excuse me. I know I know your question. You ready?
Q Well, no, you dont. No
THE PRESIDENT: The governors the governors are supposed to do testing. Its up to the governors.
Go ahead please.
Q Thats not the question. Wait a minute, Mr. President. Thats not the question.
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead please.
Q Mr. President, if we could just if we could just get back
Q The question
THE PRESIDENT: Quiet.
Q The question was
THE PRESIDENT: Quiet.
Q The question, Mr. President
THE PRESIDENT: Quiet.
Q The question is
Q If we could just get back to May 1. Mr. President, how many
Q they say that they are not that they are following your lead, that they are not social distancing.
THE PRESIDENT: The governors are doing the testing. Its now not up and it hasnt been up to the federal government.
Go ahead.
Q Thats not what Im asking. The question is about social distancing, sir.
Q Mr. President, I have a quick follow on the WHO, but if May 1
Q The question is if
THE PRESIDENT: I told them when they put this guy here, its nothing but trouble. Hes a showboat.
Q Im just trying to ask you a question.
THE PRESIDENT: If you keep talking, Ill leave
Q Im just trying to ask a question.
THE PRESIDENT: and you can have it out with the rest of these people.
Q Im just trying to ask a question. Im just
THE PRESIDENT: If you keep talking, Im going to leave and you can have it out with them.
Q Its a simple question.
THE PRESIDENT: Just a loudmouth.
Go ahead.
Q If you if you could kind of clarify: Are you basically lifting your Slow the Spread before the
THE PRESIDENT: No.
Q May 1 deadline?
THE PRESIDENT: No.
Q And then
THE PRESIDENT: Im not at all. No.
Q And then and then how many states
THE PRESIDENT: The governors are going to be running their individual states. Some of them will say, No, I cant open now. And some of them may last longer than we even would think. Others will say, I can.
You can go I dont want to mention states, but there are numerous states that are in great shape right now. Theyre viewing the rest of the country like we dont even believe this is happening. We have a lot of those states. Theyre set to open, practically, now. I mean, they would be open now. Were going to let them open sooner than the date. Were going to pick a date. Were going to get a date thats good. But its going to be very, very soon sooner than the end of the month.
But there are many states out there that are looking at this and theyre reviewing it and theyre saying, We shouldnt be even included in this. You know, there are some that want to open up almost now.
Now, if we disagree with it, were not going to let them open. Were not going to let them open. If some governor said you know, has a lot of problems, a lot of cases, a lot of death, and they want to open early, were not going to let it happen. So were there to watch. Were there to help. But were also there to be critics.
And on testing very important weve always wanted the states to do the testing. Were now providing great testing, but the state has to provide the great testing. The state has to provide the ventilators, but they didnt do that. So we ended up going into the ventilator business, essentially, and we made tens of thousands of ventilators and we solved a big problem for the states. But we want them to do the testing, and we are there to help.
Yeah, please.
Q I have two questions. Or I have a question on the governors
THE PRESIDENT: One question. Just one.
Q Well, I have a question on the governors. But first, can I follow up Jordans
THE PRESIDENT: One question. Go ahead.
Q Can I follow-up on Jordans question?
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead.
Q Do you want to walk back where you did praise China in January for being transparent about the coronavirus?
THE PRESIDENT: Im always respectful of China.
Q But
THE PRESIDENT: Im respectful of other countries. Why wouldnt I be respectful of China? In the meantime, China has paid us nothing in your last administration, nothing in any previous administration.
They paid us tens of billions of dollars because of what weve done. And the trade deal we have, they have to give us $250 billion in purchases. Lets see if they do that. And theyre also paying us 25 percent on $250 billion in tariffs. So were taking in wait a minute. Were taking in billions of dollars for China from China. They never paid us 10 cents. Thats a great thing.
Now, if they dont produce or if we find out bad things, were not going to be happy. But right now and and were doing that. Thats what were doing.
Look, we have an investigation underway. Were paying almost $500 million. We have an investigation underway on the World Health Organization. We will find out exactly what went on. And we may be satisfied that it can be remedied and we may be sata- satisfied that its so bad that it cant be remedied. And if it cant, were going to go a different route.
Q But thats not my question. Youre criticizing the WHO for praising China for being transparent, but you also praised China for being transparent in January.
THE PRESIDENT: I dont talk about Chinas transparency.
Q In January, there was a tweet.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, you know, if Im so good to China, how come I was the only person the only leader of a country that closed our borders tightly against China?
Q Im talking about how you said they were transparent.
THE PRESIDENT: And, by the way, when I closed our border, that was long ahead of what anybody you can ask anybody that was in the room. Twenty-one people. I was the one person that wanted to do it. Deborah can tell you that better than anybody. I was the one person that wanted to do it. You know why? Because I dont believe everything I hear, and I closed. And if we didnt close our border early very early, long before the kind of dates youre talking about we would have had thousands and probably hundreds of thousands more death.
Please.
Q Im talking about how you said
Q Mr. President
THE PRESIDENT: Please. Thats enough. Thank you.
Q they were transparent.
{snip}
So well open it up in beautiful, little pieces as it comes along.
Please, go ahead. Behind you.
Q Yes. Just a quick question. You spoke about Governor Cuomo. Just wondering if you have any thoughts on some of his remarks from earlier today, where he basically said that were New York to be pressured to be open, it would be a const- it would cause a constitutional crisis.
And he basically said that you declared yourself King Trump. So Im wondering if you heard those thoughts and
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, I mean, Ive declared myself as king. You know, I heard he said that. But I didnt I didnt see the remarks. But he understands how we helped him.
He needed help. We gave him 2,900 hospital beds; he didnt use them. We gave him a ship; he didnt use them. And Im not saying but Im saying thats good, because you know what? That means he didnt need them. But we said it was too much, but we wanted to err we said, Err on the side of caution, as I said. We said, Look, we dont think you need it, but if you do, were going to have them built.
And the Army Corps of Engineers did a fantastic job. And the U.S. Navy did a fantastic job, when we moved a ship that was not meant for COVID and we had it redesigned for COVID. But they still didnt have very many people going in.
No, we are well get along just fine. He understands. Well get along just fine.
Please.
{snip}
Yeah, in the back. Go ahead, please.
Q Mr. President, thank you very much. I have two questions. One is from a person who cant
THE PRESIDENT: One question.
Q But a person who cant be here. And so I
THE PRESIDENT: Who cares? If you cant be here, thats too bad, you know. Right?
{snip}
I want to thank you all very much. So a lot of positive things are happening. Were going to have some very strong recommendations for the governors. Were going to work with the governors. The governors are going to do a good job. And if they dont do a good job, were going to come down on them very hard. Well have no other choice.
Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you.
END
7:20 P.M. EDT
Remarks by President Trump in Press Briefing
HEALTHCARE
Issued on: April 14, 2020
Rose Garden
6:14 P.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Please. Very importantly, Id like to begin by saying that weve just reached agreement the Secretary of Treasury, Steve Mnuchin, with the major airlines, all of our great airlines to participate in a Payroll Support Program. This agreement will fully support airline industry workers, preserve the vital role airlines play in our economy, and protect taxpayers. Our airlines are now in good shape, and they will get over a very tough period of time that was not caused by them.
The United States is continuing to make substantial progress in our war against the virus. We grieve at every precious life that has been lost to the invisible enemy, but through the darkness, we can see the rays of light. We see that tunnel. And at the end of that tunnel, we see light. Were starting to see it.
More than ever before, weve held our rate, the numbers everything weve done. Weve been very, very strong on it and very powerful on it. You look at whats happening in other countries Spain, Italy, United Kingdom. Were working with them. Were trying to help them, especially with ventilators. Theyve been calling a lot. They need ventilators so badly.
Fifteen percent of counties within the United States have zero cases, and many counties within the United States have a very small number of cases. Large sections of our country are really looking at other sections and saying, Wow, that looks bad. But they dont have the problem.
I salute the American people for following our guidelines on social distancing even you people. Its so different looking out there when I look at you. Their devotion, your devotion is saving lives.
Today Im instructing my administration to halt funding of the World Health Organization while a review is conducted to assess the World Health Organizations role in severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus. Everybody knows whats going on there.
American taxpayers provide between $400 million and $500 million per year to the WHO. In contrast, China contributes roughly $40 million a year and even less. As the organizations leading sponsor, the United States has a duty to insist on full accountability.
One of the most dangerous and costly decisions from the WHO was its disastrous decision to oppose travel restrictions from China and other nations. They were very much opposed to what we did. Fortunately, I was not convinced and suspended travel from China, saving untold numbers of lives. Thousands and thousands of people would have died.
Had other nations likewise suspended travel from China, countless more lives would have been saved. Instead, look at the rest of the world. Look at parts of Europe. Other nations and regions, who followed WHO guidelines and kept their borders open to China, accelerated the pandemic all around the world. Many countries said, Were going to listen to the WHO, and they have problems the likes of which they cannot believe. Nobody can believe.
The decision of other major countries to keep travel open was one of the great tragedies and missed opportunities from the early days. The WHOs attack on travel restrictions put political correctness above lifesaving measures. Travel bans work for the same reason that quarantines work. Pandemics depend on human-to-human transmission. Border control is fundamental to virus control.
Since its establishment in 1948, the American people have generously supported the World Health Organization to provide better health outcomes for the world and, most importantly, to help prevent global health crises. With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have deep concerns whether Americas generosity has been put to the best use possible.
The reality is that the WHO failed to adequately obtain that and share information in a timely and transparent fashion.
The world depends on the WHO to work with countries to ensure that accurate information about international health threats is shared in a timely manner, and if its not, to independently to tell the world the truth about what is happening.
The WHO failed in this basic duty and must be held accountable. Its time, after all of these decades. The WHO failed to investigate credible reports from sources in Wuhan that conflicted directly with the Chinese governments official accounts. There was credible information to suspect human-to-human transmission in December 2019, which should have spurred the WHO to investigate, and investigate immediately.
Through the middle of January, it parroted and publicly endorsed the idea that there was not human-to-human transmission happening despite reports and clear evidence to the contrary. The delays the WHO experienced in declaring a public health emergency caused valuable time, tremendous amounts of time. More time was lost in the delay it took to get a team of international experts in to examine the outbreak, which we wanted to do, which they should have done. The inability of the WHO to obtain virus samples, to this date, has deprived the scientific community of essential data.
New data that emerges across the world on a daily basis points to the unreliability of the initial reports, and the world received all sorts of false information about transmission and mortality.
The silence of the WHO on the disappearance of scientific researchers and doctors and on new restrictions on the sharing of research into the origins of COVID-19 in the country of origin is deeply concerning, especially when we put up, by far, the largest amount of money. Not even close.
Had the WHO done its job to get medical experts into China to objectively assess the situation on the ground and to call out Chinas lack of transparency, the outbreak could have been contained at its source, with very little death very little death and certainly very little death by comparison. This would have saved thousands of lives and avoided worldwide economic damage.
Instead, the WHO willingly took Chinas assurances to face value, and they took it just at face value and defended the actions of the Chinese government, even praising China for its so-called transparency. I dont think so. The WHO pushed Chinas misinformation about the virus, saying it was not communicable and there was no need for travel bans. They told us, when we put on our travel ban a very strong travel ban there was no need to do it. Dont do it. They actually fought us.
The WHOs reliance on Chinas disclosures likely caused a 20-fold increase in cases worldwide, and it may be much more than that.
The WHO has not addressed a single one of these concerns nor provided a serious explanation that acknowledges its own mistakes, of which there were many.
America and the world have chosen to rely on the WHO for accurate, timely, and independent information to make important public health recommendations and decisions. If we cannot trust that this is what we will receive from the WHO, our country will be forced to find other ways to work with other nations to achieve public health goals. Well have no choice but to do that.
Our countries are now experiencing you look all over the world tremendous death and economic devastation because those tasked with protecting us by being truthful and transparent failed to do so. It would have been so easy to be truthful. And so much death has been caused by their mistakes.
We will continue to engage with the WHO to see if it can make meaningful reforms. For the time being, we will redirect global health and directly work with others. All of the aid that we send will be discussed at very, very powerful lettel [sic] letters and with very powerful and influential groups and smart groups medically, politically, and every other way.
And well be discussing it with other countries and global health partners: what do we do with all of that money that goes to WHO. And maybe WHO will reform, and maybe they wont. But well be able to see.
As you know, in other countries hit hard by the virus, hospitals have been tragically forced to ration medical care and the use of ventilators. But due to our early and aggressive action, the skill of our healthcare workers, and the resilience of our healthcare system, no hospital in America has been forced to deny any patient access to a ventilator with all of the talk youve heard, where some states wanted 40,000 ventilators. I said, That doesnt work, 40,000. And they ended up with seven or eight thousand, and they had no problem. Forty thousand ventilators for one state is ridiculous.
The scariest day of my life was about a month ago when, after a long day of meetings, my team told me that we were going to be needing 130,000 ventilators; that we were short hundreds of thousands of ventilators. This is the system we inherited. I had governors requesting unreasonable sums that the federal government just didnt have.
And you look at the states. The states didnt have the states were not prepared. I knew that every person who needed a ventilator and didnt get one would die. And thats what we were told: They would die. I saw another countrys doctors having to make decisions on who got a ventilator and who didnt. And I knew that this would be a defining challenge of the crisis. Those that didnt get ventilators were said to be in a position only of one alternative and that was death. Would we be able to prevent Americans from dying because we couldnt get them ventilators and the ventilators that they needed and they needed immediately? I instructed my team to move Heaven and Earth to make sure that this didnt happen.
We started to smartly ration and distribute the ventilators that we had and that others had. And I got daily updates on the supply we had from requests coming in and people wanting to have updates. We had a great group of people working on it.
I instructed my team to use the Defense Production Act. And the Defense Production Act was used very powerfully more powerfully than anybody would know. In fact, so powerfully that, for the most part, we didnt have to officially take it out it was a hammer; it was a very powerful hammer in order to manufacture as many ventilators as possible.
Last year, America manufactured, from a dead start, 30,000 ventilators. And this year, the number will be over 150,000 ventilators. It could be as high as 200,000 far more than well ever need. So well be able to stockpile. Well be able to talk to states about stockpiling.
These are high-quality ventilators. We had a choice: We could do inexpensive, less productive ventilators or high-quality. Weve done a high-quality ventilator.
So we should have anywhere from 150- to 200,000 ventilators. In addition to that, we have 10,000 ventilators right now in the federal stockpile ready to move should we need them we might not should we need them in New York or New Jersey or in Louisiana or in Illinois or any other state that may need them if we have a surge.
Id like to ask Adam Boehler to come up and just say a few words. Hes done a fantastic job a young man who worked 24 hours a day on handling this situation. And Id just like to have have Adam, wherever he may be, come up and say a few words.
Adam, please. Thank you very much.
{snip}
And, with that, if you have a few questions, well take them. And if not, that would be okay too.
{snip}
Q Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, please.
Q Mr. President, you mentioned that youre going to be speaking with the all the governors tomorrow
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
Q make recommendations
THE PRESIDENT: On probably Thursday.
Q On Thursday. What if they dont listen to you or take your advice or obey you?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, listen
Q Will you
THE PRESIDENT: All right.
Q Will you consider taking away their federal funding?
THE PRESIDENT: I dont want to say that. Theyll listen. Theyll be fine. I think were going to have a good relationship. They need the federal government not only for funding and Im not saying take it away but they need it for advice. Theyll need, maybe, equipment that we have. We have a tremendous stockpile that were in the process of completing. Were in a very good position.
Again, the cupboard was bare when I got here. Nobody ever thought a thing in all fairness to previous administrations, nobody ever thought anything like this was going to happen, but it did happen.
No, the governors will be very, very respectful of the presidency. Again, this isnt me; this is the presidency. The presidency has such a great importance, in terms of what were doing. And you can talk about Constitution, you can talk about federalism, you can talk about whatever you want, but the best way Im talking now from a managerial standpoint is to let individual governors run individual states and come to us if they have difficulty and we will help them.
Yeah, John.
{snip}
Q Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead, please.
Q Thank you, Mr. President. You were just criticizing the WHO for praising China as transparent, but you were saying many of the same things about China just a couple of months ago. So, I mean, how do you square, your decision to revoke funding (inaudible)?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I did a trade deal with China, where China is supposed to be spending $250 billion in our country. Were going to be watching very much to see. Now, it got a little bit waylaid by the virus.
But, look, Id love to have a good relationship with China. But if you look and we made a phenomenal deal. China has paid because of me, China has paid us tens of billions of dollars over the course of a very short period of time. Billions of some of that money has been spent to farmers, where they were targeted by China. We cannot let that happen. We cant let that happen.
So we ended up signing a very good trade deal. Now, I want to see if China lives up to it. I know President Xi; I think he will live up to it. If he doesnt live up to it, that will be okay too because we have very, very good alternatives.
Q I was talking about the (inaudible).
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead.
Q Yeah, thank you. Today: 600,000 cases, 25,000 deaths. I know you want to bring blame the WHO, but Ive spoken to hundreds of people across the country in the last few weeks who say they still cant get tested and that they arent social distancing because they saw
THE PRESIDENT: So the governors
Q Wait wait a minute. Let me finish.
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Q So they arent
THE PRESIDENT: Excuse me. Excuse me. I know I know your question. You ready?
Q Well, no, you dont. No
THE PRESIDENT: The governors the governors are supposed to do testing. Its up to the governors.
Go ahead please.
Q Thats not the question. Wait a minute, Mr. President. Thats not the question.
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead please.
Q Mr. President, if we could just if we could just get back
Q The question
THE PRESIDENT: Quiet.
Q The question was
THE PRESIDENT: Quiet.
Q The question, Mr. President
THE PRESIDENT: Quiet.
Q The question is
Q If we could just get back to May 1. Mr. President, how many
Q they say that they are not that they are following your lead, that they are not social distancing.
THE PRESIDENT: The governors are doing the testing. Its now not up and it hasnt been up to the federal government.
Go ahead.
Q Thats not what Im asking. The question is about social distancing, sir.
Q Mr. President, I have a quick follow on the WHO, but if May 1
Q The question is if
THE PRESIDENT: I told them when they put this guy here, its nothing but trouble. Hes a showboat.
Q Im just trying to ask you a question.
THE PRESIDENT: If you keep talking, Ill leave
Q Im just trying to ask a question.
THE PRESIDENT: and you can have it out with the rest of these people.
Q Im just trying to ask a question. Im just
THE PRESIDENT: If you keep talking, Im going to leave and you can have it out with them.
Q Its a simple question.
THE PRESIDENT: Just a loudmouth.
Go ahead.
Q If you if you could kind of clarify: Are you basically lifting your Slow the Spread before the
THE PRESIDENT: No.
Q May 1 deadline?
THE PRESIDENT: No.
Q And then
THE PRESIDENT: Im not at all. No.
Q And then and then how many states
THE PRESIDENT: The governors are going to be running their individual states. Some of them will say, No, I cant open now. And some of them may last longer than we even would think. Others will say, I can.
You can go I dont want to mention states, but there are numerous states that are in great shape right now. Theyre viewing the rest of the country like we dont even believe this is happening. We have a lot of those states. Theyre set to open, practically, now. I mean, they would be open now. Were going to let them open sooner than the date. Were going to pick a date. Were going to get a date thats good. But its going to be very, very soon sooner than the end of the month.
But there are many states out there that are looking at this and theyre reviewing it and theyre saying, We shouldnt be even included in this. You know, there are some that want to open up almost now.
Now, if we disagree with it, were not going to let them open. Were not going to let them open. If some governor said you know, has a lot of problems, a lot of cases, a lot of death, and they want to open early, were not going to let it happen. So were there to watch. Were there to help. But were also there to be critics.
And on testing very important weve always wanted the states to do the testing. Were now providing great testing, but the state has to provide the great testing. The state has to provide the ventilators, but they didnt do that. So we ended up going into the ventilator business, essentially, and we made tens of thousands of ventilators and we solved a big problem for the states. But we want them to do the testing, and we are there to help.
Yeah, please.
Q I have two questions. Or I have a question on the governors
THE PRESIDENT: One question. Just one.
Q Well, I have a question on the governors. But first, can I follow up Jordans
THE PRESIDENT: One question. Go ahead.
Q Can I follow-up on Jordans question?
THE PRESIDENT: Go ahead.
Q Do you want to walk back where you did praise China in January for being transparent about the coronavirus?
THE PRESIDENT: Im always respectful of China.
Q But
THE PRESIDENT: Im respectful of other countries. Why wouldnt I be respectful of China? In the meantime, China has paid us nothing in your last administration, nothing in any previous administration.
They paid us tens of billions of dollars because of what weve done. And the trade deal we have, they have to give us $250 billion in purchases. Lets see if they do that. And theyre also paying us 25 percent on $250 billion in tariffs. So were taking in wait a minute. Were taking in billions of dollars for China from China. They never paid us 10 cents. Thats a great thing.
Now, if they dont produce or if we find out bad things, were not going to be happy. But right now and and were doing that. Thats what were doing.
Look, we have an investigation underway. Were paying almost $500 million. We have an investigation underway on the World Health Organization. We will find out exactly what went on. And we may be satisfied that it can be remedied and we may be sata- satisfied that its so bad that it cant be remedied. And if it cant, were going to go a different route.
Q But thats not my question. Youre criticizing the WHO for praising China for being transparent, but you also praised China for being transparent in January.
THE PRESIDENT: I dont talk about Chinas transparency.
Q In January, there was a tweet.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, you know, if Im so good to China, how come I was the only person the only leader of a country that closed our borders tightly against China?
Q Im talking about how you said they were transparent.
THE PRESIDENT: And, by the way, when I closed our border, that was long ahead of what anybody you can ask anybody that was in the room. Twenty-one people. I was the one person that wanted to do it. Deborah can tell you that better than anybody. I was the one person that wanted to do it. You know why? Because I dont believe everything I hear, and I closed. And if we didnt close our border early very early, long before the kind of dates youre talking about we would have had thousands and probably hundreds of thousands more death.
Please.
Q Im talking about how you said
Q Mr. President
THE PRESIDENT: Please. Thats enough. Thank you.
Q they were transparent.
{snip}
So well open it up in beautiful, little pieces as it comes along.
Please, go ahead. Behind you.
Q Yes. Just a quick question. You spoke about Governor Cuomo. Just wondering if you have any thoughts on some of his remarks from earlier today, where he basically said that were New York to be pressured to be open, it would be a const- it would cause a constitutional crisis.
And he basically said that you declared yourself King Trump. So Im wondering if you heard those thoughts and
THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, I mean, Ive declared myself as king. You know, I heard he said that. But I didnt I didnt see the remarks. But he understands how we helped him.
He needed help. We gave him 2,900 hospital beds; he didnt use them. We gave him a ship; he didnt use them. And Im not saying but Im saying thats good, because you know what? That means he didnt need them. But we said it was too much, but we wanted to err we said, Err on the side of caution, as I said. We said, Look, we dont think you need it, but if you do, were going to have them built.
And the Army Corps of Engineers did a fantastic job. And the U.S. Navy did a fantastic job, when we moved a ship that was not meant for COVID and we had it redesigned for COVID. But they still didnt have very many people going in.
No, we are well get along just fine. He understands. Well get along just fine.
Please.
{snip}
Yeah, in the back. Go ahead, please.
Q Mr. President, thank you very much. I have two questions. One is from a person who cant
THE PRESIDENT: One question.
Q But a person who cant be here. And so I
THE PRESIDENT: Who cares? If you cant be here, thats too bad, you know. Right?
{snip}
I want to thank you all very much. So a lot of positive things are happening. Were going to have some very strong recommendations for the governors. Were going to work with the governors. The governors are going to do a good job. And if they dont do a good job, were going to come down on them very hard. Well have no other choice.
Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you.
END
7:20 P.M. EDT
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