Mitch McConnell has sipped so much of the “Trump Punch,” that he has forgotten how organized Barack Obama’s administration actually was. But don’t worry, 44 and his team are here with clapbacks and receipts.
READ MORE: Mitch McConnell calls Obama ‘classless’ over leaked Trump comments
For months, the GOP has pushed the narrative that the previous president left the country vulnerable to the perils of a major disaster, such as the current coronavirus pandemic. Led in media battle by Donald Trump, Senate Majority Leader McConnell further articulated “fake news” to his constituency, desperately promoting political propaganda that props up the current president.
“They claim pandemics only happen once every hundred years but what if that’s no longer true?” McConnell said to an online chat led by Trump’s daughter-in-law, Lara. “We want to be early, ready for the next one, because clearly the Obama administration did not leave this administration any kind of game plan for something like this.”
This tickled his audiences fancy — but is it true?
According to CNN, President Obama’s White House National Security Council did, in fact, provide the incoming administration with a plan to respond to a pandemic should one occur. The plan was made public by Politico in March and the current leaders knew about it but chose to ignore it. The document is called the “Playbook for Early Response to High-Consequence Emerging Infectious Disease Threats and Biological Incidents.”
When it is said that the Obama administration left a playbook, be clear — it was a 69-page book and not something short and lacking substance. The appendix alone was 40 pages.
Therein the federal document, experts left expansive data on what to do should the country get hit by a highly infectious virus, like Ebola or SARS. In the color-coded and checklist-style document, concerned minds look at microbes as small but deadly hazards that could ravish the nation, explicitly naming the novel coronaviruses as the type of pathogens that could sweep over the nation with ease if people don’t pay attention.
The book was so detailed that it even explained how to set up inter-agency meetings, testing models, border control measures, how people should bury their dead, and even how to articulate the crisis to the country/world without getting people scared or encouraging them to be reckless.
Ronald Klain, Obama’s Ebola response coordinator and a campaign advisor for Joe Biden, tweeted out: “We literally left them a 69-page Pandemic Playbook…. that they ignored. And an office called the Pandemic Preparedness Office… that they abolished. And a global monitoring system called PREDICT .. that they cut by 75%”
We literally left them a 69-page Pandemic Playbook…. that they ignored
And an office called the Pandemic Preparedness Office… that they abolished.
And a global monitoring system called PREDICT .. that they cut by 75% https://t.co/OD94v0UI4n
— Ronald Klain (@RonaldKlain) May 12, 2020
READ MORE: Obama lawyers demand pro-Trump group stop misleading Black voters in South Carolina
Seems like the Republicans might want to hold off on the accusations, the Democrats are clapping back — there is an election to be won … and they are bringing receipts.