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WASHINGTON – President-elect Joe Biden’s new chief of staff Ron Klain on Sunday urged the Trump administration to turn the tide and start working on a presidential transition so that “nothing falls in this change of power” that would compromise the ability of the new administration to distribute a vaccine against the coronavirus.
President Donald Trump and his campaign continue to pursue lawsuits in several states disputing the results and making unsubstantiated allegations of widespread fraud.
Meanwhile, the federal government has yet to secure a key decision from the General Service Administration that would allow agencies to begin cooperating with a transition, which Klain says “Meet the Press” has left the Team Biden unable to speak to current administration officials or begin planning how to take over during a crisis that has killed more than 240,000 people in America alone.
“Joe Biden will become President of the United States in the midst of an ongoing crisis. It must be a seamless transition, ”he said.
“We now have the option, we have to see if it’s approved, of a vaccine starting maybe in December, January. There are people at [the Department of Health and Human Services] make plans to implement this vaccine. Our experts need to speak to these people as soon as possible so that nothing falls into this power shift. “
Last week, drugmaker Pfizer announced that its vaccine appears to be 90% effective and the White House touted its “Operation Warp Speed” which it says will have enough vaccine to start vaccinating around 20 million people. per month in December.
But Biden’s transition effort says he’s started planning his own vaccine distribution because the federal government still prevents them from working with his public health officials.
Klain described the effort to get an effective vaccine from lab to manufacture, distribution, and ultimately into the arms of Americans is a “giant logistics project” that requires careful cooperation.
“It’s great to have a vaccine, but vaccines don’t save lives, vaccinations save lives,” he said.
He then called on congressional leaders to get “urgent” help to individuals and governments amid the latest surge in cases, which could ultimately have serious repercussions on health and the economy.
And he echoed Biden’s call last week for all Americans to wear masks, adding that Biden would seek to “impose” a mask mandate “nationwide”.
“On the very first working day of his transition, Monday of this week, the president-elect met his Covid task force and then made a public statement in which he called on all Americans to hide, he urged governors to impose masking mandates now and reiterated the fact that when he becomes president he will impose one nationally, ”Klain said of Biden’s Monday speech.
Biden has repeatedly entertained the idea of a federal mask warrant during his campaign, saying in September that he believed the president had “legal authority” to issue one.
Last week, a senior Biden adviser told NBC News that Biden plans to push governors and mayors to implement mask warrants and weigh a mask mandate for federal buildings. Biden did not explicitly address a federal mask mandate in his speech on Monday – he presented the practice as an urgent measure of public health and American unity.
“So please, I’m begging you, wear a mask.” Do it for yourself, do it for your neighbor. A mask is not a political declaration, but it is a good way to start bringing the country together, ”he said. “The purpose of wearing a mask is not to make your life less comfortable or to take anything away from you. It’s to give back something to all of us, a normal life.
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