‘Do You Regret Saying That?’: Mehdi Hasan Asks Jen Psaki About Infamous Covid Test Comment

Jen Psaki appeared on Thursday’s edition of The 11th Hour with Mehdi Hasan, and the guest host brought up a remark from December that the White House press secretary would like to forget.

During a press briefing last month as Omicron was surging, NPR’s Mara Liasson said, “Last week, obviously the president explained some ramp up in testing. But there are still a lot of countries like Germany, the U.K., and South Korea that basically have massive testing, free of charge or for a nominal fee.”

“Why can’t that be done in the United States?” Liasson asked.

“Well, I would say first, we have eight tests that have been approved by the FDA here,” Psaki replied. “We see that as the gold standard.”

On Thursday, Hasan prefaced his question for Psaki by saying, “Your administration has a great record on vaccinations, I give you that. But not on testing. In fact, last month you got pilloried for saying this on the subject of rapid tests.”

He played a portion of the exchange where Liasson asked Psaki, “Why not just make them free and have them available everywhere?”

“Should we just send one to every American?” Psaki responded.

Hasan truncated the clip there, but Liasson’s reply was, “Maybe!”

Of course, the Biden administration is now planning to ship up to 500 million at-home Covid tests to Americans. Each household can order up to four tests through the United States Postal Service website.

“Jen, you are now sending out rapid tests for free to every American, thankfully,” said Hasan. “In hindsight, do you regret saying that, and does the White House regret not sending those tests out sooner?”

Psaki replied,

I always wish I could add more context or say things more clearly. And what you didn’t capture there is everything I said on testing and the rest of the briefing, which I certainly understand. I should’ve added more context in that moment. What we’re doing is we’re sending tests to everybody who wants a test. That is not every American, because we’re not doing that because that would waste a lot of tests. And we want tests to go to the people that want them.

She added that “this program is working” and touted the speedy pace at which the tests are being mailed to those who requested them.

Watch above via MSNBC.

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