‘Is The Pandemic Over or Not?’ MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan and WH Chief of Staff Ron Klain Clash Over Biden’s Covid Remarks

MSNBC’s Mehdi Hasan grilled White House chief of staff Ron Klain about President Joe Biden’s remarks about the pandemic Tuesday, asking if it was fair to say it was “over” when so many people were still dying from Covid-19 and dealing with long Covid.

In a September interview, 60 Minutes’ Scott Pelley asked Biden “Is the pandemic over?” and got this response:

“The pandemic is over,” Biden said categorically. “The pandemic is over. We still have a problem with Covid. We’re still doing a lot of work on it. But the pandemic is over.”

Biden pointed to maskless attendees at the Detroit Auto Show — where the interview was conducted — to make his case.

“If you notice, no one’s wearing masks,” Biden said. “Everybody seems to be in pretty good shape. And so I think it’s changing. And I think this is a perfect example of it.”

The president’s comments drew swift backlash from the left, including Hasan, who tweeted, “One of the (many) reasons they’re not wearing masks is because people like Biden keep (falsely) telling them the pandemic is over.”

The Mehdi Hasan Show host asked Klain to explain Biden’s comments Tuesday.

“Around 11,000 Americans died in the past month from Covid, hospitalizations ticking up, hundreds of people still dying every day, long Covid affecting 1 in 5 people who got Covid, according to the CDC,” said Hasan. “How can your boss, the president, say the pandemic is over?”

Klain replied that Hasan was taking Biden “out of context,” pointing out that “the next sentence he said after that was that we have a lot more work do to on Covid.”

“There’s no question we’re in a very different place than we were two years ago –” Klain attempted to continue.

“But the pandemic is not over?” Hasan interjected. “Just to be clear, you’re accusing me of taking him out of context. Is the pandemic ‘over’ or not?”

“The fight against Covid certainly isn’t over –” Klain began.

“But the pandemic’s over, in your view?” Hasan asked again.

Klain responded that we were in a different phase now, that Americans no longer had to stay inside their homes, not go to work, because we had vaccines and treatments now. The hundreds of Covid-19 deaths per day were “tragic” but also “now preventable, in a way they weren’t two years ago.”

If people get the latest vaccines, and seek treatment if they do get Covid, “those people do not have to die,” said Klain.

“Let’s talk about that,” said Hasan, because “they’re not taking the boosters.”

Biden’s “mixed messaging” saying the pandemic was “over,” argued Hasan, whether out of context or not, “does have consequences,” as shown by America’s “abysmally low” booster rate. “That is a real problem, is it not, if people are not getting boosted? That is a failure of your administration.” Hasan pointed out that many Americans were not even aware of the new bivalent booster shot for the Omicron variant and there didn’t seem to be much of a campaign from the White House to raise awareness.

Klain retorted that they were dealing with “falsehood after falsehood after falsehood.” He added that Biden had gotten his own booster shot on national television, had given a speech encouraging Americans to get booster shots, and the White House had sent numerous officials to appear on news shows.

“And yet we have one of the worst booster rates in the Western world,” said Hasan.

The Biden administration had made the booster shots available free of charge at thousands of locations around the country, Klain insisted, with 90 percent of Americans less than 5 minutes from a location where they could get the shot, as well as making treatments like Paxlovid widely available.

The full segment with Hasan’s interview of Klain is available on YouTube, below:

Watch the video clips above, via MSNBC.