House of Democrats released a report Friday charging that the Trump administration overpaid by as much as $500 million for ventilators and delayed negotiations for an offer for shipments. The effort to acquire ventilators was led by White House adviser Jared Kushner.
The report shows that the Trump administration paid Philips $15,000 per unit – more than any other American manufacturer. Other purchasers negotiated prices to be as low as $9,327 per ventilator. This money, as the report says, “could have been used to better support our nation’s crisis response efforts.”
“The waste of taxpayer funds caused by the Trump Administration’s incompetent procurement efforts for ventilators could be as much as $500 million or more,” according to a report released by Chairman Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Illinois) on Friday.
“The Trump Administration’s mishandling of ventilator procurement for the nation’s stockpile cost the American people dearly during the worst public health crisis of our generation,” Krishnamoorthi wrote.
Subscribe to our free weekly newsletter!
A week of political news in your in-box.
We find the news you need to know, so you don't have to.
Matt Smith, a spokesman for Oversight Committee Republicans called the report an “endless quest to politicize this pandemic.”
“Rather than provide credit for the more-than quadrupling of available ventilators in the national stockpile since March, they now seek to diminish President Trump’s success by throwing a tantrum over contracting terms. This is just the latest example of a Democratic Party more concerned with partisan politics than fighting COVID-19,” Smith said.
Democrats on the committee said they conducted the investigation aimed to determine the reason for ventilator shortage in the “initial critical months” of the coronavirus pandemic.
Last week, President Joe Biden announced that he would pardon 39 people and commute the prison sentences…
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) condemned his fellow Republican lawmakers during a rant on the House floor after…
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/_kYWlyzuiMk Rep. Mike Waltz did 44 pushups to honor a bet after the Army football…
In a series of X posts on Wednesday, the platform's CEO Elon Musk criticized a bipartisan spending…
"You can't love your country only when you win." President Joe Biden has repeated this phrase to…
Rep. Susan Wild (D-Pennsylvania), the top Democrat on the House Ethics Committee, missed a committee meeting after…