Dr. Deborah Birx.Photo: Alex Wong/Getty
Dr. Deborah Birx is opening up about her time working as former presidentDonald Trump’s U.S.coronavirus response coordinator.
During a candid interview on CBS’Face the Nation,Birx — who announced last year thatshe would retireafter helping PresidentJoe Bidenand his team with their pandemic response amid his transition — shared that quitting was something that was “always” on her mind.
“Why would you want to put yourself through that every day?” she remarked. “I had to ask myself every morning is there something that I think I can do that would be helpful in responding to this pandemic? And it’s something I asked myself every night.”
“There were people who definitely believed that this was a hoax,” she said — language which Trump himselfechoed last year.
“I saw the president presenting graphs I never made,” she added. “I know that someone out there or someone inside wascreating a parallel set of dataand graphics that were sent to the president.”
“I wasable to speak freelyabout mask mandates, closing bars when you’re in the middle of a surge, closing indoor spaces where people are going to take off their mask and be inside,” she said.
As for her biggest mistake, Birx said that she wished she had “been more outspoken publicly” from the beginning.
“I always feel like I could have done more,” she said. “When you’re put into a new situation and you only know one person in the White House, you know, and you don’t understand the culture of the White House, it’s very difficult to get your footing.”
“I’m not making excuses. I’m just saying I didn’t know how far I could push the envelope. I’m known for doing that, particularly in private. But it was very difficult for me at day one to really understand that,” she added.
Birx, who was the U.S. global AIDS coordinator and a well-respected public health official prior to the pandemic, announced her retirement after she stirred after she stirred controversy for traveling to Deleware over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.
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source: people.com
