Why Have More Than 100 House Members Not Yet Taken a Covid Vaccine?

A debate is currently playing out in the House of Representatives about when the chamber can return to normal order. But the back-and-forth between Democratic and Republican leaders has revealed some noteworthy information — notably, that more than 100 members of the House still have not been fully vaccinated, despite being eligible since late December.

The statistic first came to light in a letter sent Wednesday by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA).

“[T]o date, roughly 75 percent of House members have been fully vaccinated, or will be by the end of this week,” McCarthy wrote.

Members of congress became eligible for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine almost immediately after it received government approval in mid-December. Yet more than 25 percent of the 435 voting members of the chamber have yet to complete their two-dose series.

McCarthy’s letter was part of an effort to get the House to open up for regular business. That effort was picked up the next day by House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) — who had a spirited back-and-forth on the subject with Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD).

“Roughly 75 percent of all members in this House have had a vaccination for Covid-19, there’s a strong desire to get back to a regular floor schedule,” Scalise said.

“It would be a lot simpler if every member had been vaccinated,” Hoyer shot back.

The Democratic leader noted that individual medical information is private, but some in the House have voluntarily declared that they plan to abstain. One such member is Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), who spoke to Axios about why he is declining the vaccine.

“I won’t be taking it. The survival rate is too high for me to want it,” Cawthorn told Axios in December.

Like Cawthorn, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) has gone public with his reasoning for not taking the vaccine — citing the fact that he has already had Covid-19.

“I want to see real data, not just anecdotes and analogies, that demonstrate the vaccine provides a significant benefit to those who’ve already had the virus and whether those benefits outweigh the side effects,” Massie said, in a December statement.

And vaccine skepticism is not limited to the House. Massie’s congressional colleague from the Bluegrass State, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), likewise pointed to his prior Covid-19 diagnosis as the reason he is opting against the vaccine.

Back in December, several in the House gave other reasons beyond skepticism for why they wouldn’t take the vaccine. Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) said she wouldn’t take it because she did not believe members of Congress should get priority over the elderly and frontline workers. Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC) and Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-NJ) were among those who also used this rationale to explain why they were holding off on getting their shots.

Yet most states have now opened up their eligibility to much broader segments of the population. And in all, more than 20 percent of Americans have received at least one dose.

In his floor remarks last week, Hoyer strongly implied that it is Republicans who largely comprise the group of representatives who are unvaccinated.

“I would ask my friend to urge his members to get the vaccination,” Hoyer said to Scalise. “So that both sides will know that all of our members have been vaccinated.”

And if indeed it is Republicans who are the ones abstaining, that would mirror a larger trend in the nation. An NPR/PBS/Marist poll last week found that nearly half of Republican men, and 47 percent of President Donald Trump voters in all do not intend to get the vaccine.

With demand set to decline in the coming weeks, as the entire nation will be made eligible by May 1 according to President Joe Biden, a massive campaign to encourage vaccination is set to be undertaken by the White House and the nations’s public health experts.

Dr. Anthony Fauci has said that as many as 90 percent of Americans must get vaccinated in order to achieve herd immunity. By that standard, the House of Representatives is not yet there.

Watch above, via CSPAN.