WH Advisor Peter Navarro: The CDC ‘Really Let the Country Down With the Testing’ Early On

White House trade advisor Peter Navarro knocked the CDC on Meet the Press Sunday morning over coronavirus testing.

Chuck Todd, who pressed Navarro on issues over coronavirus testing, asked about the CDC specifically and whether President Donald Trump has confidence in it right now.

“It does seem as if the initial guidelines, they didn’t want them put out. They’ve put down very limited guidelines with more detailed ones coming later,” Todd said. “CDC hasn’t been able to give a briefing now in over a month. Does the president have confidence in the CDC as our lead on this pandemic?”

Navarro said that’s a question to ask the president before saying the following:

“Early on in this crisis, the CDC, which really had the most trusted brand around the world in this space, really let the country down with the testing. Because not only did they keep the testing within the bureaucracy, they had a bad test. And that did set us back.”

“Going forward with these guidelines,” he added, “the important thing to understand here for the American people is this — opening up this economy is not a question of lives versus joba. The fact of the matter is, and what President Trump realized early on, is that if you lock people down, you may save lives directly from the China virus, but you indirectly are going to kill a lot more people.”

You can watch above, via NBC.