In 2020, Joe Biden repeatedly promised that he would “shut down the virus” and insisted that he had “a plan” to defeat it. But, unfortunately, he and Kamala Harris had also sown the seeds of mistrust in COVID vaccines developed under President Trump’s Operation Warp Speed.
“As we enter the height of election season, President Trump should assure us all that the White House will respect the independent authority of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to decide, free from political pressure, if the vaccine is safe and effective,” Biden said in a statement in July 2020.
Kamala Harris outright said she’d refuse to take any vaccine approved before the election. “I will say that I would not trust Donald Trump and it would have to be a credible source of information that talks about, ummm, the ummm, efficacy and the reliability of whatever he’s talking about. I will not take his word for it.”
Obviously, Biden and Harris were preemptively trying to blunt any political boost Trump may have gotten from a vaccine being ready before the election. And, as it turned out, the vaccines didn’t come before the election. Still, Biden would inherit two vaccines approved for emergency use by the FDA, and a third came a few weeks later — and the vaccines he and his running mate had told the country not to trust became the foundation of their COVID strategy. And they have remained so.
At first, the strategy seemed to work. As summer came on, new cases hit lows not seen since the earliest days of the pandemic.
And then they surged with the delta variant before coming down again. And then they surged with the omicron variant.
In fact, months ago, Joe Biden reportedly failed to order enough COVID testing kits because he thought focusing solely on vaccinations would be enough. So now, if you’re looking to buy some home tests — which many people currently are because of the omicron variant — good luck.
Many thought the vaccines signaled that the end of the pandemic was imminent, and Biden certainly intended to reap the political benefits. However, in hindsight, it seems that the Biden administration oversold the vaccines and their effectiveness.
Also for Our VIPs: Joe Biden Defeated by the COVID-19 Pandemic
In February 2021, Joe Biden’s coronavirus advisory board wrote an op-ed in USA Today to assuage doubts about the vaccines in the early weeks of the rollout.
“The vaccines were all 100% effective in the vaccine trials in stopping hospitalizations and death,” they insisted. “Waiting for a more effective vaccine is actually the worst thing you can do to lower your risk of getting severely ill and dying of COVID-19.”
One hundred percent effective at “stopping hospitalizations and death?” Really? While I don’t doubt the vaccines have helped, the surge in cases and deaths we saw during the delta variant wave and the surge we’re seeing now with omicron belie that argument — especially given the mixed messages the Biden administration has sent on whether it anticipated COVID variants. Clearly, they did not. They expected the vaccines would deliver, and they’d get to say, “See? Trump didn’t know what he was doing, we did, and we defeated the virus.”
The vaccines certainly are a tool to help end the pandemic, but what has become painfully obvious is that Biden never had a real plan besides urging people to get vaccinated. We know viruses mutate and existing vaccines become less effective against mutations, and COVID is a prime example.
