CNN’s Tapper Confronts de Blasio: Wasn’t Your Initial Coronavirus Response ‘Far Far Behind the Curve’?

CNN’s Jake Tapper confronted New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on whether his delayed response to the spread of the coronavirus impacted the severity of the crisis the city is now facing.

As de Blasio talked about the ongoing coronavirus response, Tapper brought up comments the mayor made in the past few months, including earlier this month, in which de Blasio said “New Yorkers should go about their lives” as normal despite the coronavirus.

“The last clip was from March 13th, just about two weeks ago,” Tapper said. “In retrospect, is that message, at least in part, to blame for how rapidly the virus has spread across the city?”

The mayor started by saying, “Jake, we should not be focusing, in my view, on anything looking back on any level of government right now. This is just about how we save lives going forward. We all were working — everybody was working with the information we had and trying of course to avoid panic. And at that point, for all of us, trying to keep — not only protect lives but keep the economy and the livelihoods together, keep ensuring people had money to pay for food and medicine. This was a very different world just a short time ago.”

Tapper noted how critical de Blasio has been of the president’s response being behind the curve before asking, “I mean, Mr. Mayor, weren’t your actions in this outbreak also far, far behind the curve?”

De Blasio pointed to what he has been saying about the need for more testing, but added, “There’s no time to go back over that. There’s only time to focus on getting through the next week and the week after that. You could ask all the questions you want. They’re fair. But I think the time to deal with these questions is after this war is over, because literally here in New York City, it feels like a wartime environment.”

You can watch above, via CNN.