Trump refuses to tout COVID-19 vaccine: ‘As a Republican, it’s not a great thing to talk about’
Former President Donald Trump refused to say whether the COVID-19 vaccine works and explained that he doesn’t like to tout his administration’s work on the vaccine because “as a Republican, it’s not a great thing to talk about.”
During an interview with Fox News host Bret Baier that aired Tuesday, Trump, 77, w𒊎as asked, “In your mind, did the COVID vaccine work?”
The former president dodged the question, instead praising his administration’s efforts at promoting Regeneron’s antibody treatment for COVID and then claiming to have a “Democrat friend who’s very smart” who has questioned why he doesn’t talk more about his work rolling out COVID vaccines.
“You may have saved in the world, throughout the world, 100 million people, and you never talk about it,” Trump recalled his friend telling him.
“I said: ‘I really don’t want to talk about it, because, as a Republican, it’s not a great thing to talk about, because, for some reason, it’s just not.’” the former president told Baier.
When pressed on the reason he believes it is uncouth for Republicans to talk about vaccines, Trump blamed it on the politically charged nature of the debate 𒁏surrounding COVID shots.
“Yes, for some reason, because people love the vaccines, and people hate the vaccines, but conservatives aren’t – and I understand both sides of it, by the way. I understand both sides very well,” Trump explained.
“What I didn’t do is the mandates. The mandates and the vaccines don’t go,” Trump claimed.
Baier noted⛎ that under his administration the Pentagon mandated COVID vaccines for members of the armed forces, a fact-check Trump did not acknowledge.
“But you have a lot of people that love the vaccines. I meꦉan, you do. They happen to be more Democrat than they are Republican,” the 2024 GOP presidential primary front-runner said.&nb🌳sp;
“There are people that say I saved 100 million lives. I don’t even talk about it,” Trump bragged.
Du♍ring his sit down with Baier, Trump also suggested that his attacks against his top 2024 opponent, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, are personal and 💟the result of disloyalty on the part of the Sunshine State governor.
“I got him elected. And I thought he was very disloyal when he said: Yes, I’d run,” Trump said when asked about why he refers to the Florida governor as “Ron DeSanctimonious.”
“I’m a big loyalist,” Trump continued. “You know, some people say, some people right here in this room have told me, ‘sir, don’t worry about loyalty. Loyalty doesn’t mean anything in politics.’ I said, to me, it does. I got the guy elected. He came to see me, let’s say weeping, because he was dead. He was getting out of the race.”
“But this guy was dead politically. And for him to then say, I’m going to run against a guy that got me into office? And I didn’t need that, because I took a lot of heat,” Trump said of his endorsement of DeSantis for governor in 2017.
“I had a lot of friends that were on the other side of that one. I took big heat on that. It’s not that easy to do.”
