Q So I guess the question is: The President makes a lot of threats, knowing that he's not going to follow through or that they're not legal. So is this what he's trying to do here yet again?
MS. MCENANY: No. The President will follow through. His memo is exceedingly clear. We are pursuing every avenue within the federal government to take care of the American people. When you have a one-year-old being killed in New York, when you have a little, beautiful girl in Atlanta named Secoriea Turner who lost her life, yes, this federal government will do everything within our lawful power. And, yes, the President is serious about this.
Q Can I follow up with one last one, if I can? On Walter Reed: The President, in November, said he went to Walter Reed to begin his physical. He said he was there - this week, he said he was there to complete his physical. In fact, your predecessor said the same back then, that it was to begin it. So which one was it when the President went to Walter Reed?
MS. MCENANY: The President did his physical in two parts. These are very extensive when you're doing a presidential physical. And he used the two visits to Walter Reed to complete the physical in two stops. Again, the media is engaging in conspiracy theories about the President's health.
Yes.
Q The President noted - just to be clear, Kayleigh, you said he did it in two stops -
Q Kayleigh -
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q - but he said he completed it. This week -
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q - he said he was there to complete it. You're saying that's not true. So his statement, this was wrong, correct?
MS. MCENANY: Yes, next question. I'm not engaging in conspiracy theories anymore.
Yes.
Q It's not a conspiracy theory. I'm just asking if he was correct or mistaken.
MS. MCENANY: Go ahead.
Q I don't want to lose my turn. I'm sorry.
Q Please. No, go ahead.
Q Senator Schumer came out with a statement today, saying that too much of the evidence points to the Trump administration pressuring the FDA to approve a vaccine by Election Day to boost his reelection prospects.
Can you assure the American people that if a vaccine does come out before Election Day, is approved before Election Day, that it is safe and effective? And can you address his assertions that you are pressuring the FDA to come up with a vaccine before Election Day?
MS. MCENANY: No one is pressuring the FDA to do anything. This is, again, a bizarre theory spun up by CNN, among others.
Let me note that the FDA - you had Dr. Hahn who said this: "I can assure you 100 percent that the President has never pressured me to make a decision regarding any regulatory aspect of the FDA's work." He said that just a few months ago; it is absolutely the case. You had Secretary Azar saying this morning, about the vaccine: "Whether it's October 15th or November 1st or November 15th, this is all about saving lives."
You've had Dr. Fauci say - "We, in fact, briefed the President today" - this was a few weeks ago - "about this in the Oval Office." I was there for that briefing. And Dr. Fauci said, "There is no political pressure that I have seen at all to move quickly."
This President wants to break through regulatory barriers to get a vaccine as safely - to the American people as quickly as possible because lives are at stake. But he will not in any way sacrifice safety in making sure that this is 100 percent airtight before the American people receive it.
So the priority here is saving lives, safety, and there will be a safe and effective vaccine in the works. And again, I think that CNN spinning up this conspiracy theory, it all was based upon the CDC career -
Q Senator Schumer brought this up.
MS. MCENANY: Yes. And CNN was peddling a theory on this as well. Basically, you had career officials at the CDC who made a decision, who spoke with states about distributing vaccines. We're preparing, in advance, to have a safe and effective vaccine distributed, because unlike the Obama administration, during swine flu, they had real problems in that regard.
The Obama administration promised 100 million doses by October. They then reduced that number to 40 million for the swine flu. By mid-October, when demand for a vaccine was at its highest, supply fell dramatically short with as few as 11 million doses on hand.
You even had their CDC Director saying, "We are nowhere near where we thought we'd be by now. We are not near where vaccine manufacturers predicted we would be." We share the frustration of the people who have waited online or called a number or checked a website and haven't been able to find a place to get vaccinated.
Unlike the Obama-Biden administration, we make plans in advance. It's why we have contracts for 100 millions of vaccine production in advance, and it's why CDC career officials have worked with all 50 states to make sure that we can distribute this vaccine. We do our homework in advance, unlike Obama-Biden.
Q Just another one, Kayleigh.
MS. MCENANY: Yes.
Q Just another one. So, Vice President Joe - former Vice President Joe Biden said on Alexei Navalny's poisoning that, "The mode of attack leaves no doubt as to where the responsibility lies: the Russian state."
Does the President agree with that assessment? And has he made his voice known to the Russian government on this issue?
MS. MCENANY: So we're deeply troubled by the results released yesterday. Alexei Navalny's poisoning is completely reprehensible. Russia has used chemical nerve agents in the past, and we're working with our allies and the international community to hold those in Russia accountable wherever the evidence leads and restrict funds for their malign activities.
The Russian people have a right to express their views peacefully without fear of retribution of any kind, and certainly not with chemical agents. And no one has been tougher on the Russian government than this President.
Yes.
MS. MCENANY: Thanks, Kayleigh. On TikTok, the President said that that ban is going to take effect on September 15th if the deal is not agreed to. What will that look like? Is Google and Apple going to have to delete that app from their app stores? Are people going to have to delete it off their phones? Tell us what will happen on September 15th if there's no deal.
MS. MCENANY: I'm not going to get ahead of announcing those plans on September 15th. I know you had some questions on the timing of everything, and I told the Commerce Department to be expecting your call because they can walk you through. You had questions about the 45-day timeframe, so I did get some clarity for you on that. If you follow up with me, we can get you in touch with the Commerce Department.
Yes.
Q Yeah, Kayleigh. I just wanted to ask you about the investigation. There's a couple of contracts that were awarded that Peter Navarro was involved with. One, there's some investigation going on in terms of Kodak - the money that went to Kodak to allow them to develop pharmaceuticals. There are other contracts now for ventilators that have received scrutiny.
Can you give us an update on how concerned you are that maybe some of these business deals are going through too quickly, they're not getting enough scrutiny? Is there any particular finding that you can offer at this point on that?
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, we've made many contracts using the DPA: 78 times; 30 times with regard to testing. We're very proud of what we've done. Of course, if there are new allegations with a given company, we certainly look at those and look at them closely, as we did with the Kodak situation.
But we're very proud of what we've done. We were met with an unprecedented challenge: a novel coronavirus that came to our shores from China. And we are very proud that our contracts have enabled us to have a very large and growing stockpile.
In fact, we've rapidly increased the amount of N95s on hand to more than 60 million - we're on track to have 10 times more than pre-pandemic levels by the fall; significantly surged the number of gowns on hand more than 27 million; and we have tremendous level of ventilators on hand at 109,000, and we will have tens of thousands more by the fall.
So the contracts we've made have enabled - enabled these numbers, among others. I'm not even getting into therapeutics like remdesivir. But, of course, if there's ever an allegation, we take it seriously and look at it as we did with Kodak.
Q Can you confirm how many allegations of wrongdoing that you're looking at that involved Peter Navarro?
MS. MCENANY: I'm only aware of the one or two that you named out of the many, many contracts that we've had.
Yes.
Q Thanks, Kayleigh. The herd immunity strategy for the pandemic has been called dangerous by some experts. And I'm wondering if President Trump has formed an opinion on this concept and if he thinks that that is an achievable goal.
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, the herd immunity, so-called theory, was something made up in the fanciful minds of the media. That was never something that was ever considered here at the White House. Here at the White House, what we've done is race to get a safe and effective vaccine in record time. If we get it by the end of the year, it will far outpace Ebola, which took 14 months to get to phase three clinical trials, three years to get to completion. This will be the fastest vaccine ever for a novel pathogen.
Here at the White House, we talk about therapeutics and are very proud that we've identified - we have more than 270 clinical trials, 570 in the planning stages, and successful therapeutics that we know of, like dexamethasone and remdesivir.
That's what we do here at the White House. The herd immunity theory, again, was something made up in the mind of the media.
Q And also, on the Supreme Court, the President said that he would come out with a list of candidates by September 1st. When can we expect to see that list?
MS. MCENANY: You will see it soon, certainly within the next few weeks, but it will be after the Labor Day weekend.
Yep.
Q Thank you. Back on the cities: How would the President's plan to reduce funding to cities actually help protect citizens that you said was the goal of the President?
MS. MCENANY: Yeah, that is the goal. And what the intent is, is to incentivize cities to follow in the way of Kenosha and Minneapolis who, when they were in the midst of a situation that they couldn't handle just at the local level, they requested federal assistance, and it worked. Within 24 hours, you saw a much different scene in Kenosha; within 24 hours, a much different scene in Minneapolis.
So we want states to work with us, and those two models are examples of Democrats who have done so. On the contrary, you see a much different situation in New York and Portland and D.C. and Seattle.
And some of the factors, as noted in the memo that will go into the lawlessness assertion, are whether they forbid police from intervening, whether they've withdrawn law enforcement protection from certain areas, like we saw where a police precinct was abandoned in the lawless CHOP zone in Seattle. Those are the types of changes in behavior we want to see from cities because protecting the citizenry should be their paramount concern.
