White House press secretary Jen Psaki mocked Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) after he falsely claimed Southwest Airlines was experiencing a shortage of employees because of vaccine mandates and President Joe Biden.
Q And one last one: What’s his answer — what’s the White House response to people who say vaccine mandates have reduced the workforce and contributed to this problem?
MS. PSAKI: Well, I know world-renowned business, travel, and health expert Senator Ted Cruz has made that point. But I wouldn’t say that that is widely acknowledged or echoed by business leaders who have implemented these mandates, by health experts who have conveyed the way to get out of the pandemic is to ensure that we’re doing exactly the steps the President has announced and we are working to implement.
It doesn’t mean this isn’t hard and challenging — of course it is; we’re in the middle of a global pandemic. But, ultimately, the job of the President of the United States is to lead, is to follow the advice of health experts, is to ensure that he is protecting the lives of people across the country.
So, I know there was a little hubbub over the course of the last few days about Southwest Airlines. We now know that some of those claims were absolutely false and, actually, the issues were completely unrelated to vaccine mandates.
But again, what we’ve seen, business to business, across the country, is this is the way to save lives, create more certainty; it’s good for the economy; and it’s something we’re looking forward to implementing.
