AP’s Jon Lemire Accuses GOP of ‘Anti-Science Strain’

Associated Press White House reporter Jonathan Lemire said on Friday that “there’s been an anti-science strain” in the Republican Party.

Appearing on Deadline White House on MSNBC, where Lemire is a political analyst, the journalist said, “There is still a pocket of people and polling shows they are largely Republicans who are refusing to take this vaccine. Some young adults as well. Those young adults may feel they don’t need it because they’re invincible.”

“But for those Republicans it’s because it’s become a political statement and certainly there’s been an anti-science strain sort of undergirding parts of the Republican Party for quite some time now that even predates Donald Trump,” he continued. “But he’s certainly accelerated it and we heard from him just undermining trust in all sorts of government institutions throughout his time in office even before the pandemic. That adds up. His lies parroted by the conservative media. His followers willing to believe anything he says and distrusts and in the mainstream media or public health officials or Democrats say.”

Lemire went on to criticize Trump’s handling of the pandemic and that the former president’s call to get the vaccine “may be too late.”

“And then of course when the virus does arrive and the president downplayed it day after day after day, that adds up, too. And he’s never, even though he now started saying to his followers, ‘Hey, take the vaccine,’ he’s never given it a full-throated endorsement and, frankly, it may be too late,” he said. “At this point, it’s part of people’s political identity to say they won’t take this vaccine. It’s amplified on social media and it is holding back vaccination rates across the country as this very contagious variant spreads.”

Watch above, via MSNBC.