Remarks by President Trump at the Operation Warp Speed Vaccine Summit | Eastern North Carolina Now

    And when you hear 85 percent, that's some number. To me, that's a number that goes along with anything else, including the vaccines, when you think about it. As well as we've done with the vaccines, when you hear "85 percent," people - people find that one hard to believe. But you look at the stats, and you see what's happening.

    And you look at other countries; they're having tremendous difficulties in Europe - tremendous. Beyond - relatively beyond what we're having. They're having them all over the world.

    But this will vanquish the - the problem, this horrible scourge - as I call it, the "China virus," because that's where it came from.

    The virus has really been looked at and studied all over the world, and our scientists, our industrial and economic mobilization has been like nobody else in the world could have done. And it's very important that we share that with others and other nations.

    I've worked and invoked the Defense Production Act over 100 times to manufacture essential supplies in the United States. Despite the grim projections from the media eight months ago, where they said this was impossible - they actually said - and you saw that a little bit, but I could give you two hours' worth of it. But they said it will never happen; you could never do it; it was a pipe dream. But we - we did something that nobody thought was possible.

    And we also did it where no American who has needed a ventilator has been denied a ventilator. When we - when this first came out, we weren't equipped for that. Nobody was equipped for that. And we're now making ventilators. And we have all we need in this country, but we're sending them to countries all over the world. We're making thousands and thousands of ventilators a month.

    The United States has also created the largest, most advanced, and most innovative testing program in the world by far. We've conducted over 200 million tests. Think of that: 200 million tests - more than all of the European Union combined. It's not even close.

    Just 10 months ago, none of these innovations even existed. The tremendous progress that we've made is a testament to what our nation is capable of. When America is faced with a challenge, we come through - and we always come through - to overcome every hardship and surmount every obstacle. And I think you'll be seeing that over the next few months; the numbers should skyrocket downward.

    We are the most exceptional nation in the history of the world. Today, we're on the verge of another American medical miracle. And that's what people are saying. People that aren't necessarily big fans of Donald Trump are saying, "Whether you like him or not, this is one of the greatest miracles in the history of modern-day medicine" or any other medicine - any other age of medicine.


    American companies were the first to produce a verifiably safe and effective vaccine. Together, we will defeat the virus, and we will soon end the pandemic, and we will save millions and millions of lives, both in our country and all over the world. And we've already started.

    Thank you again to every person here today and for the incredible achievements that you've done. You're going to be very proud of this day, and you're going to be very proud of this period of time because nobody thought this was possible. Nobody thought it was even remotely possible to do what we've done in a period of less than nine months - something that - just not even thinkable.

    And we took a lot of heat when we said this is our goal, and we, frankly, weren't even quite using the numbers that we used. We far exceeded what we thought. If we would have said "sometime next year," I think most people would have said, "That would be great. That would be a miracle." But we did it long before sometime next year.

    So now I want to ask several leaders who have been crucial in this effort to join me on stage as I sign the executive order to ensure that American citizens have first priority to receive American vaccines. And then we're going to be working with other countries all over the world, and I think we'll be able to start doing that almost immediately also, because we have millions of doses coming in.

    So thank you very much. Thank you. It's a great honor. (Applause.)

    (The executive order is signed.)

    So, let's see here. I guess we have to do our Vice President, right? (Applause.)

    AUDIENCE MEMBER: Thank you, Mr. President.

    THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. (Applause.)

    Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you. (Applause.)

    Any questions, please? (Applause.) Thank you. Thank you all. (Applause.) Any questions, please? A question?

    Yes, please.

    Q Mr. President, it's clearly a success, this vaccine. I'm wondering, though, what your message is to the American people, given all of the increasing cases right now, about what they should do over Christmas and the hardship that they're all facing as this virus does get worse.

    THE PRESIDENT: Yeah, well, CDC puts out their guidelines, and they're very important guidelines, but I think this: I think that the vaccine was our goal. That was number one because that was the way - that was the way it ends. Plus, you do have an immunity. You develop immunity over a period of time, and I hear we're close to 15 percent. I'm hearing that, and that is terrific. That's a very powerful vaccine in itself. And just tremendous progress has been made.

    One of the reasons we do show so many - and I say this, and I've been saying it for a long time - so many cases is because of the fact that we have 200 million tests. And you take - I think India is actually in second place with just a fraction of that number. So we're many times greater than the second country, and India has 1.4 billion people where - our testing program has been incredible.

    And we actually are also coming out with new tests very shortly that will make the process even easier, and you won't need doctors necessarily to do the test. So we have some incredible tests coming out in a very short period of time.

    Yeah, please.

    Q Mr. President, some of these scientific officials here in this room have encouraged Americans not to travel this holiday season, not to go to large gatherings. Across the street, you've been holding holiday parties with hundreds of people, many not wearing masks. Why are you modeling a different behavior to the American people than what your scientists tell?

    THE PRESIDENT: Well, they're Christmas parties, and frankly, we've reduced the number very substantially, as you know. And I see a lot of people at the parties wearing masks. I mean, I would say that I look out at the audience at those parties, and we have a lot of people wearing masks, and I think that's a good thing.


    Yeah, please. Over here. Go ahead.

    Q The next administration will be the one, ultimately, that implements a lot of the distribution of this vaccine and will oversee much of the future of the way Operation Warp Speed goes forward. Why not include members of the Biden transition team as part of this summit that you're hosting today?

    THE PRESIDENT: Well, we're going to have to see who the next administration is - because we won in those swing states, and there was terrible things that went on. So we're going to have to see who the next administration is. But whichever the next administration is will really benefit by what we've been able to do with this incredible science, the doctors - all of the people that came up - the lab technicians. The wor- - the work that's been done is incredible, and it will be incredible for the next administration.

    And hopefully the next administration will be the Trump administration, because you can't steal hundreds of thousands of votes. You can't have fraud and deception and all of the things that they did, and then slightly win a swing state. And you just have to look at the numbers. Look at what's been on tape. Look at all the corruption. And we'll see. You can't win an election like that.

    So hopefully the next administration will be the Trump administration, a continuation - which has led us to the highest stock markets we've ever had, the best employment numbers we've ever had, a rebuilt military.

    If you look at - the tax reductions are the greatest in history; the regulation reductions, the greatest in history. It leads us to Space Force, which nobody thought was possible. All of the things we've done. And we were rewarded with a victory.

    Now, let's see whether or not somebody has the courage - whether it's a legislator or legislatures, or whether it's a justice of the Supreme Court or a number of justices of the Supreme Court. Let's see if they have the courage to do what everybody in this country knows is right.

    I received almost 75 million votes, the highest number of votes in the history of our country for a sitting President - 12 million more than the 63 million we received four years ago. President Obama received 3 million less in his second term, and he won easily. I received 12 million more, which, by the way, is a record. Twelve million more.

    And they say that when the numbers came out - and the numbers came through machines. And all of those ballots were taken away and added. All you have to do is turn on your local television set and you'll see what happened with thousands of ballots coming out from under tables - with all of the terrible things you saw. All you have to do is take a look.

    And if somebody has the courage, I know who the next administration will be. And I'll tell you what: Life will be much easier for this country because of what we've done right now and because of a lot of the people in this room. The job you've done on the vaccine, together with a lot of others, has been a modern-day miracle, and it's really been acknowledged as such.


    And I want to thank you. I want to give you my love, and I want to give you my thanks because you're very special people.

    And now, good luck. You distribute that, General, and really set records. Okay? Set records, just like we've been doing for four years.

    Thank you very much. Thank you, everybody. Thank you. (Applause.)

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