AP fact checks Democrats’ claims Donald Trump gutted the CDC

  We have not seen the mainstream media and the Democrats try to drum up so much pandemic fear since George W Bush was running for reelection in 2004. But they are dipping back into the playbook and they are hoping that this time around they will be able to scare Americans into voting for the Democrats by claiming the country is not ready for a pandemic because Donald Trump has already failed to protect us.

  It did not work against George Bush but they are hoping this time around the second time will be a charm, there really is nothing new under the sun when it comes to the Democratic playbook. We have heard several Democratic leaders come out trashing the President for his lack of response to the coronavirus outbreak and during the debate the other night several candidates claimed that the President gutted the CDC and this has left the United States vulnerable. The Associated Press actually decided to do some investigative journalism and fact-checked this claim.

  Here is what a couple of the candidates said during the debate:

MIKE BLOOMBERG: “There’s nobody here to figure out what the hell we should be doing. And he’s defunded — he’s defunded Centers for Disease Control, CDC, so we don’t have the organization we need. This is a very serious thing.” — debate Tuesday night.

JOE BIDEN, comparing the Obama-Biden administration with now: “We increased the budget of the CDC. We increased the NIH budget. … He’s wiped all that out. … He cut the funding for the entire effort.”

Here is what the AP found:

They’re both wrong to say the agencies have seen their money cut. Bloomberg is repeating the false allegation in a new ad that states the U.S. is unprepared for the virus because of “reckless cuts” to the CDC. Trump’s budgets have proposed cuts to public health, only to be overruled by Congress, where there’s strong bipartisan support for agencies such as the CDC and NIH. Instead, financing has increased.

  The Congress has actually increased the funding for the CDC and while Donald Trump might have proposed cuts to the agency he signed an increase CDC spending into law.

  As far as Michael Bloomberg’s claim that there is nobody at the CDC to oversea outbreak response here is what the AP found:

The broader point about there being “nobody here” to coordinate the response sells short what’s in place to handle an outbreak.

The public health system has a playbook to follow for pandemic preparation — regardless of who’s president or whether specific instructions are coming from the White House. Those plans were put into place in anticipation of another flu pandemic, but are designed to work for any respiratory-borne disease.

Among the health authorities overseeing the work are Dr. Anne Schuchat, CDC’s principal deputy director and a veteran of previous outbreaks, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, NIH’s infectious disease chief who has advised six presidents.

Another lie, here is the AP summary on these claims:

Democratic presidential contenders are describing the federal infectious-disease bureaucracy as rudderless and ill-prepared for the coronavirus threat because of budget cuts and ham-handed leadership by President Donald Trump. That’s a distorted picture.

  In others words the Democrats are lying and twisting the truth to suit their personal agenda and even the Associated Press could not run cover for the Democrats on this issue. However the Democrats are shameless and they will continue to promote the big lie knowing that for the most part the mainstream media will swear to it.

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