Trump's ex-surgeon general slams RFK Jr.'s response to CDC shootings
The shooting resulted in the deaths of one police officer, David Rose, and the shooter himself, leaving multiple buildings damaged from gunfire as students at the nearby Emory University took shelter. During a Sunday interview with CBS' Margaret Brennan 'Face the Nation,' former surgeon general Dr. Jerome Adams said Kennedy's response was 'tepid' while criticizing the secretary for the delay in addressing the violence.
'How you respond to a crisis defines a leader, and quite frankly Secretary Kennedy has failed in his first major test in this regard,' Adams told Brennan. 'It took him over 18 hours to issue a tepid response to these horrific shootings, and that's not even considering how his inflammatory rhetoric in the past has actually contributed to a lot of what's been going on.'
The CDC shooter blamed the vaccine for adding to his depression by making him suicidal. Back in May, Kennedy announced that the CDC would no longer recommend the COVID-19 vaccine for healthy children and pregnant women. 'This is a time to stand in solidarity with our public health workforce, not a moment for the media to exploit a tragedy for political gain,' HHS Communications Director Andrew Nixon told the Daily Mail in response to Adams' criticism.
Adams flamed Kennedy for previously referring to the CDC as a 'cesspool of corruption' before adding his criticisms of the agency may have influenced the shooter's actions 'He made this statement just last year,' Adams said. 'And he still has not unequivocally condemned the violence.' 'He said no one should be harmed while working to protect the public,' Adams added.
'There's an out there, Margaret. If you don't believe that people are working to protect the public, then that means it's OK to commit violence, at least in some people's eyes.' Throughout the entire first Trump administration, Adams served as surgeon general where he oversaw the development of the mRNA vaccines during Operation Warp Speed. Adams has praised the administration's development of the vaccine as one of Trump's greatest achievements, while expressing concern as the department begins cutting funds from mRNA research.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Reuters
14 minutes ago
- Reuters
Trump's summit with Putin set for 11 a.m. in Alaska on Friday
Aug 14 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump's meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin will take place at 11 a.m. (1900 GMT) in Anchorage, Alaska, on Friday, the White House said in a press schedule statement on Thursday. Trump will depart the White House at 6:45 am EDT (1045 GMT) on Friday and leave Anchorage at 5:45 p.m. Alaska Time the same day. He is scheduled to arrive back at White House early Saturday morning.
Sky News
44 minutes ago
- Sky News
Russia's master negotiator knows Trump's weaknesses and will try to exploit them
Vladimir Putin will know exactly how he wants this to play out. He is the master negotiator who's been doing this for decades. He'll be across all the details, the history and the legal arguments. And he'll know that his opponent is not. His strategy will be to exploit that. I think the ultimate aim for the Kremlin leader is to convince Donald Trump that the quickest path to peace is a deal on Russia's terms. But he can't present it like that. He'll have to give the appearance of making concessions because he knows the American president can't lose face here. He must have something to show from this summit. 3:44 That something could be the promise of a meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, which Trump has once again talked up the chances of. But if that's the case, I suspect it'll be a loose promise, with strings attached. Something the White House can claim is progress, but may prove unachievable. I expect the Russian president will seek to play on Trump's desire for a rapid resolution to the conflict and his desire to take credit for it. That's why Putin has been buttering him up ahead of the meeting, praising Trump's "energetic and sincere" efforts to find peace. I think he'll also try to appeal to Trump's transactional nature and seek to tempt him with various sweeteners that could come from siding with Russia. 4:41 That means things like rare earth deals and joint projects in the Arctic, which is why the Russian delegation includes finance minister Anton Siluanov and Kremlin investment envoy Kirill Dmitriev. It also includes defence minister Andrei Belousov, which might suggest that Putin is serious about proposing a deal on nuclear arms control, after raising the prospect of it on Thursday. Only one pact remains between the US and Russia, and it expires in February. A new one would almost certainly be a prize the American president would go for. 2:54
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
Terry Cole, chosen to take over DC's police force, has spent 22 years at DEA
Attorney General Pam Bondi on Thursday named the head of the Drug Enforcement Administration, Terry Cole, as Washington's 'emergency police commissioner' as she carries out President Donald Trump 's unprecedented decision to take over the Washington police department. Bondi said she's giving Cole the powers of police chief and the Metropolitan Police Department must receive Cole's approval before issuing any orders. The move comes less than a month after the U.S. Senate conformed Cole to be the DEA's leader and he was sworn in as head of the agency. Here's what to know about Cole: Three decades in law enforcement Cole was most recently Virginia's secretary of public safety and homeland security under Gov. Glenn Youngkin, according to his biography on the DEA's website. He's spent more than 31 years as a law enforcement officer, including 22 at the DEA. At the agency, he worked in Oklahoma, New York and Washington. He spent time overseas in Colombia, Afghanistan and the Middle East. The agency said he fought drug cartels and transnational criminal organizations. He was the DEA's acting regional director of Mexico, Canada and Central America when he retired from the federal government in 2020. Prior to joining the DEA, he was a police officer in New York State. Bachelor's in criminal justice Cole graduated from the Rochester Institute of Technology with a bachelor's degree in criminal justice. He has certificates in leadership from the University of Virginia and the University of Notre Dame Mendoza School of Business. Late-night announcement of a new job Bondi announced Cole's new role in a directive Thursday evening. It said Cole would assume 'powers and duties vested in the District of Columbia Chief of Police.' It wasn't immediately clear how this affected Pamela Smith, the city's current police chief, who works for the mayor. Hours earlier, Smith had directed Washington police to share information with immigration agencies regarding people not in custody — such as someone involved in a traffic stop or checkpoint. But the Justice Department said Bondi disagreed with the police chief's directive because it allowed for continued enforcement of 'sanctuary policies.' Bondi said she was rescinding that order as well as other department policies limiting inquires into immigration status and preventing arrests based solely on federal immigration warrants. All new directives must now receive approval from Cole, the attorney general said.
