The Trump White House has changed the official stated mission of the Strategic National Stockpile after Senior Advisor to the President Jared Kushner lied during Thursday’s nationally televised coronavirus task force briefing. Kushner’s words immediately caused outrage as video of his false claim circulated quickly on social media. By Friday morning #JaredKushnerForPrison was trending on social media.
The mission of the Strategic National Stockpile, according to its website which was changed late Friday morning, had read:
“Strategic National Stockpile is the nation’s largest supply of life-saving pharmaceuticals and medical supplies for use in a public health emergency severe enough to cause local supplies to run out.”
“When state, local, tribal, and territorial responders request federal assistance to support their response efforts, the stockpile ensures that the right medicines and supplies get to those who need them most during an emergency. Organized for scalable response to a variety of public health threats, this repository contains enough supplies to respond to multiple large-scale emergencies simultaneously.”
Kushner blasted the nation’s governors and other local elected officials on Thursday, saying:
“The notion of the federal stockpile was it’s supposed to be our stockpile. It’s not supposed to be states’ stockpiles that they then use.”
The Strategic National Stockpile’s mission on its federal government website now reads:
“The Strategic National Stockpile’s role is to supplement state and local supplies during public health emergencies. Many states have products stockpiled, as well. The supplies, medicines, and devices for life-saving care contained in the stockpile can be used as a short-term stopgap buffer when the immediate supply of adequate amounts of these materials may not be immediately available.”
Note the very obvious deletion of “state, local, tribal, and territorial responders.” It also makes clear the federal government has little intention of helping state, local, tribal, and territorial responders.
The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake was first to report on the alteration.
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