Reports confirm that Dr. Anthony Fauci did not consent to be included in the recent Donald Trump campaign video ad. He says his statement was even taken out of context.
Speaking to CNN, the U.S. government’s top infectious disease expert, Dr. Fauci, clarified being featured in the latest Donald Trump campaign. As it turns out, not only did he not consent to the ad appearance, but his words were allegedly misrepresented.
As readers should note President Donald Trump continues to be slammed by the media and the critics for downplaying COVID-19. He is still currently battling COVID-19 for himself, yet he somehow turned it around as a form of empathizing with the suffering public.
Dr. Fauci statement was not even aimed at Donald Trump
The recent Trump campaign ad advocates:
“President Trump is recovering from the coronavirus, and so is America. Together we rose to meet the challenge, protecting our seniors, getting them life-saving drugs in record time, sparing no expense.”
The ad was described by multiple media outlets as “touting” Trump’s way of handling the coronavirus pandemic, which many would likely oppose.
According to Dr. Fauci, the statement taken from him was from months ago. Also, as it turns out, it wasn’t even directly for President Trump. In the video, Fauci was seen and heard saying: “I can’t imagine that anybody could be doing more.”
However, per the renowned doctor:
“In my nearly five decades of public service, I have never publicly endorsed any political candidate. The comments attributed to me without my permission in the GOP campaign ad were taken out of context from a broad statement I made months ago about the efforts of federal public health officials.”
Furthermore, he strongly echoed the same sentiments to The New York Times, saying his statement was actually directed to “the entire effort of the task force.”
Trump campaign defends using Fauci’s words correctly
In response to Fauci’s claim, CNN further reports the statement of Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh.
Murtaugh strongly affirms:
“These are Dr. Fauci’s own words. The video is from a nationally broadcast television interview in which Dr. Fauci was praising the work of the Trump Administration. The words spoken are accurate, and directly from Dr. Fauci’s mouth.”
Indeed, The words are coming from Dr. Fauci. As it turns out, however, it was taken from a Fox News interview in March. He was talking about the work he’s been doing with the White House coronavirus task force at the onset of the outbreak.
He was praising the team he was part of—”the broader government effort,” per The New York Times. CNN quotes Dr. Fauci’s entire original statement, which reads:
“We’ve never had a threat like this. The coordinated response has been…There are a number of adjectives to describe it — impressive, I think is one of them. We’re talking about all hands on deck. I, as one of many people on a team, I’m not the only person,” Fauci said at the time. “Since the beginning, that we even recognized what this was, I have been devoting almost full time on this. I’m down at the White House virtually every day with the task force. It’s every single day. So, I can’t imagine that under any circumstances that anybody could be doing more.”
Moreover, Dr. Fauci remains to be a popular public official. He has been observed to truly not favor any public officials, even the President.
In fact, he has since clarified himself after Trump misrepresented his words during the Presidential Debate about mask-wearing.
When Joe Biden asserted that masks can save lives, Trump argued that “Dr. Fauci said the opposite.”
However, per Fauci, when experts discouraged rush buying masks, they were worried about the shortages and hoarding. They, later on, changed their mind when asymptomatic transmission was detected.
Since then, Fauci has gone on multiple media interviews to encourage mask-wearing, as it was seen to prevent said transmission.
Featured image courtesy of The White House/Flickr