A senior health official from the Trump administration says it is unclear whether it will be safe to hold the Republican National Convention (RNC) in Jacksonville next month, as Florida sees a record number of coronavirus cases.
Sunday’s comments came a month after Republican officials moved the event from North Carolina over a dispute over health precautions.
Stephen Hahn, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, also declined to confirm President Donald Trump’s claim that 99 percent of coronavirus cases were harmless and called the situation a “serious problem.”
With a record number of people testing positive for the virus in Jacksonville and throughout Florida, Hahn was asked if it would be safe to hold the typically large RNC meeting in just seven weeks.
On Saturday, Florida reported a new record of nearly 11,500 new coronavirus cases, amid an increase in cases in the western and southern states. To date, nearly 130,000 people have died in the U.S. Amid 2.83 million cases.
“I think it is too early to know,” Hahn said of CNN’s State of the Union program. “We will have to see how this unfolds in Florida and in other parts of the country.”
In June, the Republican Party announced that it would move most of the convention’s activities to Jacksonville from Charlotte after a battle over coronavirus security concerns with North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat.
The Charlotte Observer reported that the Governor would not guarantee that the event could be held in full capacity in August.
Cooper also said in a letter to Republican National Convention officials that masks and social distancing would be a necessity at that meeting.
Trump, in a tweet, said the governor had succeeded. “absolutely impossible for the Republican Party to have its Convention there. “
The Governor of North Carolina, @RoyCooperNC, made it absolutely IMPOSSIBLE for the Republican Party to have its Convention there, and we all love the State. Millions of dollars, and JOBS, lost by state. VOTE FOR @DanForestNC!
– Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 2, 2020
Meanwhile, the city of Jacksonville, led by Republican Mayor Lenny Curry, began requiring masks in public last week after the number of cases continued to rise.
‘Totally harmless’
Trump is known to thrive in large crowds at his campaign rallies and has not adopted masks or social distancing measures at events since the country began reopening since the coronavirus closed.
The president has also repeatedly tried to minimize the jump in confirmed cases and stated without evidence in a July 4 speech that 99 percent of cases in the United States were “totally harmless.”
Hahn, a member of the White House coronavirus task force, was asked to comment on his boss’s statement.
“Therefore, I am not going to analyze who is right and who is wrong,” he said. “It is a serious problem we have. We have seen the increase in cases. We must do something to stop the tide.”
SOURCE:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
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