Tapper Confronts WH Adviser Navarro for Slamming CDC: ‘You’ve Been Very Agile in Dodging the Questions’

CNN’s Jake Tapper confronted White House adviser Peter Navarro Wednesday over his public criticisms of the CDC amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Tapper opened by bringing up those criticisms of the CDC on Sunday, as well as HHS Secretary Alex Azar’s immediate pushback an hour later. Navarro said at the time the CDC “let the country down” with respect to testing early on.

Navarro immediately pivoted to touting U.S. success on ventilators and how the country is now able to export ventilators to other nations.

Tapper said that’s certainly good news but drew Navarro back to the issue at hand, showing Navarro the video of Azar and Kevin Hassett defending the CDC after Navarro’s public criticism.

Navarro did not directly answer and instead talked about what he told Tapper was another big American success story during the pandemic on the manufacture of pharmaceuticals.

After talking about that effort, Tapper remarked, “Let me just ask you, because you’ve been very agile in dodging the questions, but just when Alex Azar and you had this conversation about all these wonderful developments, did he repeat to you that he thought your comments about the CDC were inappropriate and inaccurate?”

Navarro laughed and said, “We’re now going back there. You can fish all you want on CDC today, but this fish ain’t biting. I think what I love to do when I talk with folks on CNN like yourself, I just want to talk about jobs, manufauring, the security of our supply chain. ”

Tapper also confronted Navarro about President Donald Trump’s criticisms of China and the WHO, saying that while the criticisms are fair, the president himself “also praised President Xi” early on.

You can watch above, via CNN.