Dr Deborah Birx, the former coordinator of the Trump White House Coronavirus Task Force, says nothing in her four decades of public service has prepared her for the chaotic Trump White House or the politically charged handling of the pandemic, saying ‘Face the Nation’ which she ‘always’ considers resigning her post.
In an interview on Sunday’s “Face the Nation”, Birx told moderator Margaret Brennan that even close colleagues with whom she had worked during decades of research on the AIDS virus questioned her political loyalty amid ‘ a wave of criticism against Trump’s White House response. to the virus.
“I mean, why would you have to go through that every day? Colleagues of mine that I have known for decades … decades in the one experience, because I was in the White House, decided that I became this political person, even though “they have known me forever. I had to ask myself every morning, is there anything I think I can do that will be helpful in responding to this pandemic, and it is something I have asked myself every night,” she said. Brennan said.
Birx, who was appointed by former President Obama as administrator of PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief), joined the Trump administration in March 2020 to help coordinate the COVID-19 response.
She added: ‘When it became a point where I was getting nowhere and it was just before the election, I wrote a very detailed communication plan about what should happen the day after the election and how it should be carried out. And there was a lot of promise that it would happen. ‘
Birx explained to Brennan that at that point it was clear how the 2020 election was a factor in the task force’s diminished communication about the deadly virus. She said she had been “censored” by the White House, had not been able to do national media for a while, but insisted she had never deliberately restrained the public herself.
More than 400,000 Americans have since died from the virus, and millions have lost their jobs as a result of the economic downturn.
In her interview, the occupational health official addressed the criticism she received towards the end of her term in the White House and the subsequent stress on her family for spending time at a family holiday home after the Thanksgiving holiday, despite the leadership of Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. not to travel or mingle with those outside their own household at the time.
She told Brennan she plans to retire from her current role at the CDC “within the next four to six weeks”, with a four-decade career in the civil service as an army officer, administrator of PEPFAR AIDS research and ultimately a tumultuous serve as one of the best U.S. officials leading the government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic.
Questions about Birx’s role in the current government were also raised on Friday, as Steven Portnoy, CBS News, asked the White House press secretary whether Birx was still in President Biden’s reaction team COVID-19.
“I’ll have to circle back on that one,” said press secretary Jen Psaki. “That’s an excellent question.”
More of Birx’s interview will be broadcast this Sunday on ‘Face the Nation’ on CBS at 10:30 EST.