‘The Five’ rips Biden for catastrophic COVID response, calling it a ‘winter failure’
‘The Five’ panel knock Biden administration for mixed messages on COVID-19.
Fox host Jesse Watters and his colleagues on "The Five" agreed that President Biden is continuing to fail at attaining his promise of defeating the pandemic, following a largely uneventful press conference on Tuesday.
Biden doubled down on his claim the ongoing situation is a "pandemic of the unvaccinated" despite breakthrough cases of vaccinated individuals being infected with COVID-19. The president told Americans to use internet search engines to find a COVID test rather than offering a plan to provide more tests for the country.
"I know this remains frustrating, believe me, it is frustrating to me. But we are making improvements. We have more capacity for in-person tests we should see waiting lines shortened, and more appointments freed-up," Biden said Tuesday. "Google ‘COVID tests near me’ to find the nearest site where you can get a test most often and free."
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President Donald Trump listens as Dr. Anthony Fauci speaks about the coronavirus in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House, Tuesday, April 7, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Watters said Biden's predecessor, former President Trump, would never have gotten a pass for proclaiming Google to be a serious strategy to cure the testing issue:
"If I need a test I will Google it. Can you imagine if Donald Trump told people to Google where to get a test – with lines around the block?" he said.
Watters went on to point to previous pandemics, such as the Avian flu and Spanish flu, remarking that the then-novel viruses petered out after about 3 to 4 "waves" of varying infections. The COVID-19 virus is on its 4th wave, he said, adding that an oncologist he recently spoke with predicted the current microbe to be much less of a problem in about a month or so.
"If history is any guide, we are going to get rid of this nasty beast pretty soon. I just don’t know why Joe Biden did not know that as he has literally been around for 100 years. And he should have managed the expectations better," Watters said.
Hosts Dana Perino and Geraldo Rivera took issue with Biden's claim the pandemic continues to be one caused by the "unvaccinated."
Perino said that despite being vaccinated, boosted, and having elected to receive her annual flu shot, she came down with viral symptoms over the Christmas holiday.
"[Biden] is not sitting outside for three hours waiting for tests, and we are depleting our small supply of tests by testing everybody who does not even need a test," she said. "The other thing that I am going to take exception to is when he said that this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. I'm vaccinated, and I am glad I am, because I feel protected from serious illness or hospitalization or even death, that said, I have two vaccines, I was boosted, I also got a flu shot and I spent the whole entire week of Christmas sick as can be after getting two negative rapid tests, one positive, and a negative in order to come back to work. This is no longer about the unvaccinated, we are all suffering from it."
Rivera said he was broadcasting from his home studio in Ohio, and referenced the fact he has been heavily critical of unvaccinated Americans as Biden has.
However, Rivera went on to explain that upon returning from a vacation in Florida, he tested positive for the virus despite taking all such precautions laid out by Perino and the rest of the panel.
"I took the test and [my wife] Erica is negative and I am positive. It was shocking to me. It was in some ways embarrassing. I did not quite know how to respond to it, so I did what I usually do, I went on Twitter," he remarked.
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