Rep. Jordan slams House coronavirus subcommittee as 'unfair' and 'partisan' as experts warn about need for more tests

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Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, pulled no punches Tuesday when he laid into Democrats on the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis for assembling what he said was an “unfair” and “partisan” hearing meant to deride President Trump’s response to the pandemic.

Jordan, who also bemoaned the fact that the hearing was held remotely and not on Capitol Hill, argued that the hearing should focus on how Americans can get back to work safely amid the public health crisis, not to look at how the Trump administration responded to the contagion.

“This is a committee to go after the president,” Jordan said. “We’ve already got a political statement from the very first witness.”

“Why did we set up a partisan committee? Why did we set up an unfair process?” Jordan said, before adding that he believes it was because Democrats didn’t like that Trump cut off flights from China and stopped funding to the World Health Organization (WHO).

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Jordan’s comments regarding “a political statement from the very first witness” were in response to a statement made by Harvard Global Health Institute Director Dr. Ashish Jha in his opening remarks. Jha criticized the United States’ initial response to the coronavirus outbreak, saying the slow reaction to the pandemic resulted in more than 80,000 deaths in the country.

“We must do better,” Jha said, adding that the most important thing that can be done to control the spread of the contagion is to continue ramping up testing. “Testing is critical… Testing is the cornerstone of controlling any disease outbreak.”

The lack of proper testing, especially among vulnerable segments of the population, was echoed by every witness at the hearing.

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Former Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner Dr. Mark McClellan said that the U.S. was testing only between 2 and 3 million people for the virus per week when that number should be at least 6 million.

“We should be on track to test 3.5 million people a week by the end of May and 6 million per week by September,” he said. “That is a long way off.”

The argument by experts that testing needs to be drastically expanded echoes complaints that many Democrats have voiced with the White House.

Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.; Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., and 40 Senate Democrats authored a letter to Trump on Tuesday calling for the president to marshal federal resources for fast and free testing.

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"We are deeply troubled by the lack of detail and strategy in your testing blueprint, and we fundamentally reject the notion that the federal government bears this little responsibility in increasing testing capacity," the senators wrote to Trump.

The White House must submit to Congress by May 24 a national testing plan, under the coronavirus response legislation signed into law last month aimed at helping small businesses. The nearly $500 billion legislative package includes $25 billion for testing, which Democrats urged Trump to quickly allocate.

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During a visit to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on March 6, Trump touted the U.S. testing efforts and argued that America already had plenty of "beautiful" tests.

"Anybody who wants a test can get a test," Trump said at the time. Since then, the president has continued to boast of the country’s testing ability, frequently saying the U.S. has conducted more tests than anywhere else in the world.

While the U.S. has conducted millions of tests for COVID-19, it is also far and away the country with the most cases of the disease. As of Wednesday afternoon, there were more than 1.3 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. with more than 82,000 people dead, according to statistics compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University.

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While testing has ramped up since March, governors and health experts have warned there are still not enough tests to check everyone to see if they have coronavirus before they head back to work and school. Trump has sought to put the responsibility of testing on local governments, but the states argue they need federal help to secure enough testing kits and supplies so they can safely quarantine and treat the sick.

"The Trump administration must not shirk its responsibilities and leave states and Tribes to fend for themselves," the senators wrote.

The U.S. is averaging about 240,000 tests per day, with more than 7 million people tested in total. Harvard researchers predicted at least 500,000 to 700,000 tests daily would be needed to reopen the economy.

Fox News’ Marisa Schultz contributed to this report.