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In November 2020, a raft of Republican lawmakers and right-leaning commentators condemned Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo for, according to them, politicizing Pfizer's announcement that the COVID-19 vaccine it had been developing appeared to be 90% effective. On Nov. 9, Tom Elliott, the right-leaning founder of the media company Grabien, tweeted out a short clip of Cuomo's appearance on ABC's Good Morning America, earlier that day. In the clip, Cuomo says: Well, it's good news-bad news, George [Stephanopoulos]. The good news is the Pfizer tests look good, and we'll have have a vaccine shortly. The bad news is that it's about two months before Joe Biden takes over, and that means this administration is going to be implementing a vaccine plan. Elliott summarized Cuomo's remarks as follows: @NYGovCuomo says it’s 'bad news' Pfizer’s Covid vaccine came during the Trump Admin; says he’s going to work w/ other governors to 'stop' distribution 'before it does damage.' Republican lawmakers seized upon Cuomo's remarks as evidence that he was expressing dismay that outgoing U.S. President Donald Trump, and not President-elect Joe Biden, would earn political plaudits from the rollout of the vaccine. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida retweeted Elliott's video clip, adding: This is everything the American people hate about politics. @NYGovCuomo is upset we’re making progress on a COVID vaccine under @realDonaldTrump. The goal should be to develop a vaccine as quickly as possible & get it distributed to as many people as possible. Period. Full stop. In a statement, Sen. Ben Sasse of Nebraska wrote: On the floor of the Senate, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said of Cuomo, I guess he would have preferred the life-saving breakthrough be delayed longer...with more American deaths in the meantime. House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (La.-01) tweeted: Let me get this straight: Huge, potentially life-saving news for Americans is announced—COVID vaccine is 90% effective in trials. And the Left reacts by saying it's 'bad news' because it happened while Trump is in office? Unbelievable. They're beyond parody at this point. Similar sentiments were expressed by Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, and Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves claimed Cuomo was jealous that the Trump administration got us here. Cuomo's remarks also formed the basis of an article on the right-wing Blaze website, whose headline read 'Bad news'? Gov. Cuomo's response to groundbreaking COVID-19 vaccine shows just how much he REALLY cares about human lives. On Facebook, Fox News host and Trump ally Sean Hannity posted a clip from Cuomo's interview, along with the headline Gov. Cuomo: Pfizer’s Covid Vaccine Is ‘Bad News’ as It Will Be the Trump Admin. Distributing It. Those criticisms were premised upon misleading characterizations of what Cuomo said. Cuomo was not expressing dismay that Trump, rather than Biden, would get the credit for rolling out the vaccine. Rather, he expressed concern that the Trump administration would mishandle planning for the distribution of the vaccine whereas, in his view, a Biden administration would not. The Blaze's and Hannity's characterization of Cuomo's remarks were also misleading on a more basic level, since they described him as saying Pfizer's announcement was bad news, even though a cursory look at his remarks would show that he also said The good news is the Pfizer tests look good, and we'll have have a vaccine shortly. Cuomo's comments came during an interview with George Stephanopoulos on the Nov. 9 episode of Good Morning America. In the interest of providing context, the following is a transcript of the relevant section of the exchange, which can also be viewed in full, below: A few points are immediately clear from watching the full interview. Firstly, Cuomo welcomed Pfizer's announcement, saying The good news is the Pfizer tests look good, and we'll have have a vaccine shortly. Secondly, Cuomo did not say that Pfizer's announcement of positive early testing data was itself bad news. He said the bad news was that planning for the distribution of the vaccine would be overseen by the Trump administration, rather than Biden's administration, which will take office in January 2021. Whether or not one agrees with his reasoning or his claims, Cuomo explained that he believed the Trump administration had mishandled the distribution of COVID-19 tests, and on that basis, he believed they would do the same when planning the distribution of the vaccine. While he made it clear he would, in principle, prefer the national vaccine plan to be overseen by a Biden administration, he did not say he would therefore rather see a delay in the public receiving vaccinations. It was therefore particularly disingenuous of McConnell to suggest, as he did in the Senate, that Cuomo would have preferred the life-saving breakthrough be delayed longer ... with more American deaths in the meantime. Similarly, Cuomo also did not say he intended to block distribution of the vaccine itself, contrary to Elliott's false claim that he says he’s going to work w/ other governors to 'stop' distribution 'before it does damage.' In reality, Cuomo said we can't let this vaccination plan go forward the way the Trump administration is designing it, and vowed to fix what he saw as the Trump administration's likely vaccine distribution plan, or stop it. That does not mean he would prefer that the vaccine not be distributed at all, simply that he was strongly opposed to what he saw as the likely manner in which Trump would distribute the vaccine. Taking into account the full extent of what Cuomo said, it's clear that Republican lawmakers and right-leaning commentators grossly distorted his remarks, and falsely claimed he had said Pfizer's Nov. 9 announcement was bad news simply because that positive development had come during Trump's tenure in office.
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