Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT) on Thursday sounded off on the coronavirus as Congress weighs additional funding to combat the virus’ spread.
During MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Murphy criticized the “lack of seriousness” in the President Donald Trump administration regarding the coronavirus, but said the administration “is not wrong” to say there is a low risk right now in the United States of contracting the virus.
“There’s been just a lack of seriousness in this administration that is very, very worrying up until today,” Murphy outlined. “And so, this will expedite the ability to get tests out there. Listen, I think it is important to say that the administration is not wrong, that today your risk is pretty low in the United States of contracting coronavirus, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t know. And this money, if we get it approved in the Senate today, the president puts his signature on it, will help. Remember, the president asked for $1.5 billion. This is going to be $8.5 billion. So if the president got what he wanted, we wouldn’t have the resources necessary to speed up the testing regime.”
He added, “My sense in the early meetings was that the administration just sort of thought states and local governments could handle this, that the federal government didn’t really have an early role to play. And that just is not the case. The only way that you tackle epidemics like this is through national leadership.”
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