Donald Trump called Fox News to discuss COVID-19 vaccines, running in 2024 and Meghan Markle
In a wide-ranging interview, Donald Trump weighed in on the safety of the COVID vax, his political future and Meghan Markle.
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Donald Trump has claimed he hopes Meghan Markle makes a run for president in 2024.
The bizarre comment came during a televised phone call between the former US president and Fox News host Maria Bartiromo, who asked Mr Trump if he had heard the rumours that the Duchess of Sussex has been meeting with Democrats to consider a run for the Oval Office.
“Well I hope that happens because if that happened I think I’d have an even stronger feeling toward running. I’m not a fan of hers … I happen to know the Queen, as you know. I’ve met with the Queen and I think the Queen is a tremendous person, and I am not a fan of Meghan,” Mr Trump said.
During the interview, Mr Trump was asked a number of times about potentially running for president again, but refused to provide a clear answer.
“The polls want me to run again. But we have to see what we can do with the House. We need better leadership in the Senate,” he told Bartiromo, hinting that the 2022 midterm elections would cement a decision.
“I think we have a chance at taking back the House, I think we have a chance to do better in the Senate, and frankly we will make our decision after that,” he said.
Bartiromo also asked if Mr Trump – who has received the COVID-19 vaccine along with his wife Melania Trump – would recommend Fox News viewers get the vaccine.
“I would recommend it, and I would recommend it to a lot of people that don’t want to get it. And a lot of those people voted for me frankly, but you know, again, we have our freedoms and we have to live by that and I agree with that also,” he said.
“But it’s a great vaccine, it’s a safe vaccine and it’s something that works. And we’ve been working round the clock and what I got the FDA to do this would have happened many many years from now if I didn’t get involved and if we didn’t get involved.”
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RUSSIA, IRAN TARGETED US ELECTION
Russia and Iran targeted election infrastructure during the 2020 US vote but did not compromise any of the results, the departments of Homeland Security and Justice said Tuesday.
“Broad Russian and Iranian campaigns targeting multiple critical infrastructure sectors did compromise the security of several networks that managed some election functions,” the government agencies said in a joint report.
“But they did not materially affect the integrity of voter data, the ability to vote, the tabulation of votes, or the timely transmission of election results.” Russian, Iranian and Chinese government-affiliated actors also “materially impacted” the security of networks associated with American political organisations, candidates, and campaigns, the report said.
“Several such actors gathered at least some information they could have released in influence operations, but ultimately we did not see any such materials deployed, modified, or destroyed,” it said.
The report said there was “no evidence that any foreign government-affiliated actor prevented voting, changed votes, or disrupted the ability to tally votes or to transmit election results.” It specifically shot down a conspiracy theory floated by lawyers for former president Donald Trump’s campaign that a voting tabulation company had links with Venezuela and manipulated election results in favour of his opponent Joe Biden.
The report said the public claims had been investigated and “determined that they are not credible.” The authors of the report said they looked solely at the impact of foreign government activity on the security and integrity of election infrastructure.
“It did not address the effect of foreign government activity on public perception or the behaviour of any voters, nor did it address the impact of non-state foreign actors like cybercriminals,” they said.
BIDEN TO HOLD FIRST PRESS CONFERENCE
President Joe Biden will hold his first formal press conference since taking office next week, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday.
Biden, who was sworn in on January 20, has broken with precedent by waiting so long to hold a full question and answer session with journalists. The White House says that he has frequently answered questions in informal settings instead.
The press conference on March 25 will take place more than 60 days into Biden’s term.
US media outlets both on the left and right have aimed increasingly sharp attacks at the president over the delay, with The Washington Post noting last weekend that Biden’s predecessor Donald Trump had given five news conferences by the same point and Barack Obama had given two.
Fox News has made the absence of formal press conferences into a constant headline.
Biden does take small numbers of questions from reporters, however, during daily events. On Tuesday he answered two questions just before leaving the White House for a trip to Pennsylvania to tout his huge economic stimulus package.
Psaki, who speaks for Biden, gives a lengthy briefing to journalists every day, in contrast to press secretaries during the Trump administration who often went long periods without answering questions — except on Fox News.
Critics suggest that Biden’s team is concerned about the unpredictability of a press conference and that efforts are being made to restrict him to tightly controlled events, like a widely praised speech to the nation last Thursday.
But according to Psaki, Biden has not prioritised a press conference because his first two months in office have been consumed by the massive challenges of getting his $1.9 trillion stimulus package through Congress and ramping up COVID-19 vaccinations to end the pandemic.
WHITE HOUSE CALLS ON TRUMP OVER VACCINE
The White House has suggested former president Donald Trump shouldn’t be waiting for an “engraved invitation” to join the public campaign encouraging Americans to take COVID-19 vaccines.
President Joe Biden’s press secretary, Jen Psaki, noted that all other living former presidents, including Democrat Barack Obama and Republican George W. Bush, have delivered public service announcements.
Mr Trump, by contrast, has kept largely quiet since leaving the White House and moving to his luxury resort in Florida.
“Every other living president … has participated in public campaigns. They did not need an engraved invitation to do so. So he may decide he should do that. If so, great,” Ms Psaki said.
“If former president Trump woke tomorrow and wanted to be more vocal about the safety and efficacy of the vaccine, certainly we support that.” The United States is on track to produce far more vaccine than it is likely to need for the entire population. And with logistical problems gradually being ironed out, experts expect the biggest hold up to mass vaccination will be scepticism among parts of the population.
Polls show that Republican men, who are overwhelmingly supporters of Mr Trump and his “Make America Great Again” or MAGA platform, are leading that resistance to getting vaccinated.
Asked about the phenomenon, Mr Biden said that his predecessor’s opinion on vaccines mattered less than advice from local medical and community leaders.
“I discussed it with my team and they say the thing that has more impact than anything Trump would say to the MAGA folks is what the local doctor, what the preachers, what the local people in the community say,” he told reporters.
“So I urge, I urge all local docs, and ministers, and priests to talk about why, why it’s important to get that vaccine, and even after that — until everyone is in fact vaccinated.”
Mr Trump and his wife Melania got their own vaccines before leaving the White House in January, an advisor said.
Unlike Biden and other current officials who got their shots live on television, Mr Trump in a highly unusual move kept his own vaccination private.
‘EVERY AMERICAN WILL BE ELIGIBLE’
Every American will be eligible for COVID vaccination by May and small group celebrations will be possible for July 4 under new federal guidelines.
US President Joe Biden announced the bold and hastened timeline for a return to normal life in his first prime time address to the nation.
Speaking from the East Room in the White House, Mr Biden also pledged to double the number of pharmacies giving vaccines, double the number of mass-vaccination centres and expand the types of professions who could administer the shots.
Dentists, doctors, vets and medical students are among those to be tasked with injections.
Mr Biden announced last week that there would be sufficient vaccine supply for every American by the end of May.
His speech came exactly a year after the WHO first described the coronavirus as a pandemic and also on the anniversary of a speech from his predecessor, Donald Trump, in which he declared COVID would “go away”.
Mr Biden spoke of a “collective suffering … one year since everything stopped because of this pandemic”.
“I know it’s been hard, I truly know,” Mr Biden said.
The US has suffered among the world’s worst coronavirus tolls with a continuing daily death count of about 1500.
An improved rollout over recent weeks has seen 18.4 per cent of the country vaccinated.
Mr Biden paid tribute to those who had died not just from COVID but also deaths from other diseases and noted the loss of in-school education and family time.
He said that 527, 726 Americans had died from COVID since the pandemic started.
“This virus has kept us apart. Grandparents haven’t seen their grandchildren or children, parents haven’t seen their kids. Kids haven’t seen their friends,’ he said.
“The things that we used to do that always filled us with joy have become the things that we couldn’t do. It broke our hearts.”
Describing the pandemic response as “one of the most complex operations we’ve ever undertaken as a nation”, he said the US would continue on a “war footing to get the job done”.
“For all of you asking when will things get back to normal, here is the truth.
“The only way to get our lives back to get our economy back on track is to beat the virus.
“Thank God we are making some progress.”
He said the vaccine supply was now “months ahead of schedule” and that an “army of vaccinators” would speed up the rollout that now reached 70 per cent of Americans over 70.
Mr Biden’s address came 50 days into his presidency and exactly a year after the World Health Organisation first declared the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic.
He was speaking hours after his first legislative victory, signing into law the $2.44 trillion (US$1.9 trillion) American Rescue Plan, which will deliver up to a single payment of $1800 (US$1400) for every adult as soon as this weekend.
Mr Biden didn’t take questions at the end of his speech. He has taken an historically long time to hold a press briefing, with Barack Obama having first taken questions 20 days into his presidency and Donald Trump doing so at 27 days.
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