Pence faces furious backlash after he’s caught moving the goalposts on COVID vaccinations
Vice President Mike Pence defended the administration's distribution of coronavirus vaccines in the face of criticism from President-elect Joe Biden and numerous medical experts.
Administration officials, including Pence, promised 20 million doses would be distributed before 2020 ended -- which happens Thursday -- but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says only 11.4 million doses have gone out and just 2.1 million have been administered.
"The Trump administration's plan to distribute vaccines is falling far behind," Biden said Tuesday. "I'm going to move Heaven and Earth to get us going in the right direction."
Pence, however, took exception to the criticism and fired back late Tuesday on Twitter to defend himself and President Donald Trump.
"Operation Warp Speed is on track to distribute 20 Million doses of Coronavirus Vaccine by next week," Pence insisted. "Millions of Americans have been vaccinated and we are working with States every day to vaccinate millions more. This is no time for playing politics!"
But many commentators noted that Pence had apparently changed the Trump administration's stated goals.
How it started: How it's going: https://t.co/uh9rVEaBhe— Benjy Renton (@Benjy Renton)1609336519.0
The 20 million figure was Trump administration's own benchmark. They announced it themselves in early November, nob… https://t.co/xQcpj4vvrA— David Frum (@David Frum)1609340143.0
They said they would vaccinate 20 million people by the end of the year. Now Pence sneakily changes that to “distri… https://t.co/wfkwiPh9ju— Helen Kennedy (@Helen Kennedy)1609335890.0
In virtually every campaign rally Trump promised 100 million PEOPLE would be vaccinated by the end of December. https://t.co/t6mmrAFfCG— Glenn Kessler (@Glenn Kessler)1609301806.0
Other Twitter users fact-checked the vice president and asked whether he was still vacationing for the holidays in Vail, Colorado.
This is being bungled so badly at every level of government its hard to fathom. You've had literally months to prep… https://t.co/7fuxQdB7aj— Fred Wellman (@Fred Wellman)1609337227.0