The Pandemic Treaty Will Compound Past Mistakes
The new Pandemic Agreement and revisions to the International Health Regulations (IHR) – both legally binding instruments – are being negotiated for adoption during the 77th meeting of the World Health Assembly, May 27 to June 1, 2024.
This article, by Michael T. Clark, explains why developing country delegates should vote no, and why prudent national, provincial, and community public health leaders everywhere should welcome a decision to scrap the current proposals, undertake a serious reflection on what just happened during the Covid-19 pandemic, and begin anew.
Michael T. Clark is a specialist in the political economy of international relations. He has held a variety of positions in international diplomacy, business, research, and the international civil service, including more than nine years as Senior Coordinator for Governance and Policy at the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations. He earned his B.A. at Harvard and an M.A. and Ph.D. at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
1. The premise of a new “era of pandemics” in the 21st century is founded upon a fundamental misreading of the evidence.
The identification of apparently new, emergent virus outbreaks is an artifact resulting from the recent advances in the technology of pathogen testing and identification – PCR, antigen, serology, and digital sequencing – and the growing reach and sophistication of public health systems worldwide. Most pathogens in the WHO global mapping of viruses should not be described as new or emergent, but newly identified or characterized. Most are also either low virulence or low transmissibility resulting in very low mortality.
Deaths on the order of magnitude of Covid-19 due to naturally occurring pathogenic outbreaks are extremely rare – on the best evidence available, a once-in-129-years event. As demonstrated by researchers at Leeds University, the evidence from the last century and the first 20 years of this century shows that pandemic caseloads, frequency of outbreaks, and lethality reached a peak nearly twenty years ago and have been declining sharply ever since. The urgency of putting in place new and binding arrangements in expectation of an impending global viral attack is not justified by evidence.
2. The Covid-19 pandemic was a major “event” that called for a high level of international consultation and collaboration. But what was truly extraordinary was the policy response – including the vitally important and consequential financial response.
The policy response included travel bans, lockdowns, school closures, mask and vaccine mandates, accelerated vaccine development and curtailed safety and efficacy testing, and widespread indemnification of manufacturers of health products, including medicines, test kits, and vaccines against liability and compensation for harm. There was also experimentation with social control, suppression of free speech, and denial of other basic human rights.
Most of these measures were of dubious effectiveness and were disproportionate and inappropriate to the actual threat. The collateral damage from these actions was also historically extraordinary. Lockdowns, travel restrictions, and numerous other controls disrupted supply chains, shut down businesses, denied workers access to employment and income, and placed the global economy in an induced coma. The net effect of these “public health” measures was the largest and sharpest worldwide decline of economic activity since the Great Depression and World War II.
Even more damaging in the long run was how governments responded by pumping out massive amounts of money, the oxygen of economic life, to avoid complete economic and financial collapse and worldwide social and political chaos. Nearly all governments resorted to massive fiscal deficits. Those who had access to hard currency, either through accumulated savings or the power of the “printing press” – were profligate in their spending and managed to cushion the immediate blow. In the first year of the pandemic alone, according to the (unsourced) June 2021 estimate of the G20 High Level Independent Panel on Financing the Global Commons for Pandemic Preparedness and Response, the worldwide cost to governments was $10.5 trillion.
The lion’s share of this sum was generated in the OECD countries, but for smaller, poorer countries without recourse to the printing press, the impacts were smaller in absolute terms, but proportionally much larger, more diverse, and longer-lasting.
The economic and financial consequences of the chosen policy responses included disruptions to food and energy supply chains and rising costs of critical commodities, exacerbated by a negative shift in exchange rates as international investment flows came to a halt and hot money exhibited its usual “flight to safety” in the US and EU. Food prices increased for importing countries that lacked easy access to hard currency.
While major, prolonged disruptions to food supply chains were avoided, local and national disruptions occurred in many countries. These economic dislocations plunged tens of millions into poverty and many more into malnutrition and food insecurity – this while some few hundred “pandemic billionaires” gained enormously from the “Great Reset” of the “Zoom” economy and from vaccine and medical supply profiteering.
For developing countries, the negative effects of the pandemic response continue to compound. The inflation that exploded in the US and elsewhere as soon as the economy began to reopen led to another ham-fisted policy response authored in the Global North: austerity-inducing interest rate rises (the steepest in more than four decades), which inevitably extended to the whole world, with massive impacts on external indebtedness and dampened investment and growth across most of the developing world.
Rapidly rising debt and debt servicing costs have shrunk public budgets and reduced public investment in education and health, key to future growth and escape from poverty. The World Bank reports that most of the world’s poorest countries are in debt distress. Altogether, the developing countries spent $443.5 billion to service their external government and government-guaranteed debt in 2022; the 75 poorest paid $88.9 billion in debt service in 2022.
3. The pandemic did not “cause” the policy response or the collateral damage; rather, the policy response was an expression of the policy preferences of the narrow base of WHO donor countries and private interests that account for more than 90 percent of the World Health Organization’s funding.
The political consensus among those who steered the policy response was not evidence- or science-based and stood, by and large, in sharp opposition to the WHO’s standing recommendations and the cumulative experience of the WHO in dealing with pandemics and public health emergencies.
4. The Covid-19 pandemic was the third “emergency” event in less than 20 years that was converted by a dubious policy response from essentially a reasonably well-contained local affair into an ever-larger global crisis.
First, the 9/11 attacks by Islamic terrorists led to a declaration of an open-ended global “war on terror” financed by massive deficit spending in the US to support two “forever wars” in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Second, the 2008 world financial and economic crisis, which was followed by massive bailouts of banks and other financial institutions, and massive reliance on quantitative easing in the US, and later Europe, protected financial institutions but distorted global finances, depressed investment in developing countries, and choked world trade in commodities, upon which most developing countries depend.
And third, the Covid outbreak, like the other emergencies, spawned a policy response cooked up outside the UN system, but then executed by United Nations institutions: the UN Security Council (for the War in Iraq), the IMF, the World Bank (for the financial crisis), and the WHO for the pandemic emergency. In all three instances, poor and working people in both the Global North and Global South bore the brunt of the harm caused by the policy response, while the biggest wealth holders were not only protected but further enriched.
5. In each of these crises, the policy response had strong and lasting impacts on development, but developing nations had no real voice outside of UN institutions.
Further, in each of these instances, the real center of decision-making lay outside the multilateral institutions themselves, located instead in informal, notionally temporary but exclusive arrangements such as the “coalition of the willing” formed to support the US-led war against Iraq, the elevation of the G20 to heads of state level in the financial crisis, and the highly organized network of donors and wealthy foundations, philanthropies, and private sector entities who act in concert to direct the activities of the WHO. To add insult to injury, in each case major efforts were made by the United States and others to manipulate, dissemble, and suborn the multilateral institutions.
6. There has not been to date any serious, sustained multilateral undertaking to review and assess (1) the true origin of the Covid-19 pandemic; (2) the decision-making process that led to the policy decisions taken; or (3) the ultimate balance of benefit and harm resulting from the recommended policy response in the immediate, short and medium terms.
There is currently no consensus on the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 pathogen. The lead contending theory is a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology where US and Chinese scientists are known to have been conducting gain-of-function research (research to deliberately create super-pathogens by increasing the transmissibility, virulence, or vaccine resistance of known pathogens) using coronaviruses similar to SARS-CoV-2. The most compelling alternative theories propose an animal (zoonotic) origin, but no consensus has been reached on the most likely pathway for an animal source to humans. Given the enormous weight of the Covid-19 experience in shaping our understanding of the pandemic threat, further investigation, perhaps under no-fault protection of witnesses, is warranted.
The process through which the WHO Director-General exercised his extraordinary power to declare a public health emergency of international concern (PHEIC) also bears much closer examination. In particular, the risk assessment process and criteria used by the WHO staff who briefed the Emergency Committee and the Director-General should be closely scrutinized to develop guidance that would enable better-informed recommendations for future contingencies. The very limited role of WHO Member States in the deliberative process – a process reserved to Member States in the UN Security Council in matters of war and peace – should be carefully reviewed.
Finally, Member States need to compare the relative costs and benefits of the WHO’s Covid-19 recommendations with the varied experiences of countries that departed from the WHO’s recommendations.
7. One of the most negative consequences resulting from the unpopular implementation of WHO-recommended policy measures is the massive erosion of public trust in public health authorities that has taken place since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic.
This is true of both national and international public health authorities. Still, the WHO is now most at risk of political punishment, owing in large part to the remarkable attention that the pandemic treaty negotiations are (rightfully) receiving from dissenters across the US and increasingly in capitals across Europe, Japan, and Australia, as well as some developing countries.
Descriptions of these dissenters as “anti-vaxxers,” “conspiracy theorists,” “crackpots,” and “populist demagogues” by WHO officials, parroting their donor masters, does a deep disservice to the truth and to the honorable motives behind their dissent. And it only strengthens the perception that the WHO is indeed the responsible center of action that must be defeated.
8. In 2020, the WHO Director-General already had the authority unilaterally to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern and to make nominally “non-binding” and practically unenforceable, but nonetheless authoritative recommendations thereafter; the new pandemic treaty and revised International Health Regulations commit Member States to a five-year, $155 billion investment to create a worldwide infrastructure for WHO-centered and directed pandemic surveillance, coordination, monitoring, and compliance enforcement.
In the ominous words of jurist Carl Schmitt: “Sovereign is he who decides the exception.” Seen in these terms, the decision of the WHA “by consensus” (i.e., without a recorded vote) to delegate decision-making powers to the Director-General that would normally be reserved to the Member States will be a fateful move, made more remarkable by the failure of the Member States to place any meaningful institutional checks on this authority. But perhaps so long as the WHO lacked the means to energetically apply its authority, it has been assumed that there was little to fear, and the decision to declare a PHEIC could be described as a technocratic decision without serious political import.
If so, the experience of the Covid-19 public health response should be enough to trigger a rethink of these assumptions. And the extensive commitment to “strengthen WHO” not as an instrument of collective action by sovereign states, but as an entity empowered to act suo moto (on its own motion) and to enforce, by various means, compliance with its directives is a clear game-changer.
The following features of the WHO’s pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response plans point to political risks and conflicts that, far from strengthening the WHO, in fact become incentives to abandon it:
- the ability to mandate state actions by the WHO;
- the vast, interlinked surveillance structure that is being developed;
- the contemplated use of multilateral funding to ensure operational control and “accountability” of Member States;
- creation of an extensive system of pathogen sharing along with (still) unregulated research and development, including gain-of-function experimentation;
- the designation of fighting “misinformation” and “disinformation” as a core competency (and implied obligation) of Member States;
- the proposed establishment of emergency control over production and distribution of a wide variety of “medical products.”
9. Summing up, the pandemic treaty and the many IHR revisions are not a power grab by the WHO Secretariat, but rather a power grab of the WHO, by its public and private donors.
In the many-mirrored world of multilateralism, things are seldom what they appear to be. In the negotiation of international agreements, the meaning of words often dissolves into “calculated ambiguity,” a common diplomatic practice intended to reduce friction and enable the “successful” conclusion of difficult agreements.
The UN, it is said, “never fails;” but when it does, it is always the Organization that gets blamed. And this is the case here: as the pandemic treaty becomes a lightning rod for pent-up popular frustration and anger over the many failures of the Covid-19 policy response, it is the Organization that has become the focus of scorn and likely retribution, and not the true authors of the many ill-considered policy choices that failed so ignominiously.
10. The vote of the 194 Member States represented at the 77th meeting of the World Health Assembly should be an unambiguous “No” to the treaty and IHR package, both “as is” and as the basis for any future negotiations.
Elements from the current draft agreement may be taken up in a new, expanded, and time-bound process, with the following conditions to establish an appropriate and proportionate evidence-, science-, and comparative experience-based foundation for future deliberation and negotiation:
- There should be a thorough examination of the decision-making process for declaring a PHEIC, both as it was exercised in the Covid-19 declaration and on prior and subsequent occasions. The process shall consider the need to differentiate between emergencies of different magnitude and type of threat, to utilize standardized practices of risk assessment, to estimate potential collateral damage, to perform cost-benefit analysis, and to develop practices to ensure a proportionate and well-reasoned response. Above all, the review should devote considered attention to lack of representation of Member States in the deliberative as well as the decision-making process.
- There should be an independent, critical, and deliberately antagonistic (“Team A/Team B”) review process to assess how WHO recommendations for action, including public health and social policies, were formulated and promulgated by the WHO Secretariat, the quality of the evidence base upon which decisions were made, and the reasons for overturning previous guidance and recommendations. The role of Member States and non-state actors in this process should also be explored, along with the variable ways that Member States responded to the recommendations. Particular attention should be paid to the ways that Members did or did not exercise independence in interpreting their obligations and in adapting centralized recommendations to distinctive national circumstances.
- There should be a careful, extensive examination of the multidimensional impacts of the full policy response, including fiscal policies and their differential impacts across national territories and over time, to better understand the implications of different policy choices in future. This review should be as dispassionate and transparent as possible, recognizing that rebuilding trust in public authority is an important objective of this review process. Actors and actions should not be characterized in politicized or pejorative terms, while the basis and impact of real policy should be examined and tested against evidence.
- The variable ways in which Member States followed, adapted, or rejected WHO recommendations provide a natural experiment yielding important evidence of the benefit or harm of different policy choices in varying circumstances. A disciplined and innovative effort should be undertaken, perhaps through town halls jointly sponsored by the WHO and national health authorities, to collect and assess evidence to demonstrate the value of, and provide guidance on, how to encourage national and community ownership through a more flexible and locally adaptable policy response process. Evidence, including Cochrane meta-analyses of peer-reviewed studies conducted by licensed clinicians, should be reviewed to assess:
- the potential of alternative therapeutic approaches to contain viral infections.
- the impact on individuals of alternative public health and social policies to contain viral spread while minimizing disruption of core economic, health, and food systems.
- Particular attention should be paid in this exercise to the extent to which the sanctity of the doctor-patient relationship in clinical decision-making was or was not protected, and how it can be better protected in the future.
- There should be a careful analysis of all existing evidence of the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic. In the matter of the lab-leak hypothesis, US, Chinese, and other researchers may be provided exemption from prosecution for any actions that they may disclose: this is intended to maximize the likelihood of establishing the most complete and candid assessment possible. The inquiry should be conducted in a way that sheds additional light on the potential value and risk of gain-of-function research. Findings should be made public in a way that provides important stimulus to informed international debate and assessment of the need and modalities to outright ban or to stringently regulate such research.
Conclusion
The best option, considering the issues highlighted here, would be a complete restart of the negotiating process based on new premises, a more open and inclusive Member States-led process, and sound, appropriately humble, and truthful respect for science and its limitations, evidence, and countervailing evidence, the wisdom of experience and acknowledgment of legitimate differences.
To simply vote no would leave the current situation – the situation that led to the many Covid-19 pandemic failures – unaddressed. But any putative “benefit” of the new treaty is likely to be marginal at best. More importantly, the treaty and amendments as they are currently written do enormous, identifiable harm and would leave everyone, except those with stakes in Big Pharma, IT services, and global finance, far worse off.
Peter Schiff: Silver Has New Support at $30
In this episode, Peter recounts silver’s notable rise above $30/oz and addresses the latest FOMC minutes that were released this week, in which the Fed signaled that rate cuts could be delayed even further. Peter also calls out the SchiffGold Silver Breakout Sale to celebrate the metal’s long-awaited breakout.
Silver’s rise to $32.50 on Monday has established a new support level at $30/oz:
“Silver is back down at $30.73. That’s a pretty substantial pullback—about $1.80 or so— from the $32.50 that it traded for on Monday. …That doesn’t mean Silver can’t go below $30, but I think $30 is to silver what $2,000 was to gold. Once we broke up $2,000, $2,000 became support, and yes, every once in a while we dip below $2,000, but we never stayed below it for long, and it quickly came back.”
While the Fed is uncertain about when rate cuts are likely, it’s still signaling a loosening of monetary policy later this year. The market mistakenly sold off gold and silver in response:
“The traders who are selling gold and silver still don’t understand why the prices are rising in the first place. It doesn’t matter when the Fed cuts rates. It doesn’t even matter if they do cut rates. They never have to cut rates. The Fed could leave rates right where they are, and gold and silver prices should skyrocket. Why is that? Because they’re too low. The Fed aborted the hiking campaign too soon, and so it doesn’t matter if they cut rates.”
The Fed pays lip service to raising rates if needed but fails to see that rate hikes are long overdue:
“They said that they were prepared to raise rates if the economic data supported that. But that’s not true either, because the economic data already supports that. They’re saying, ‘If the data changes, if something happens and we get new data that shows that higher rates would be appropriate, well, then we’ll raise rates.’ … The data that they’re looking at right now shows that interest rates need to go up. The fact that they’re ignoring that data— and they’re not only not hiking rates, but they’re still talking about when they’re going to cut rates— that proves that they’re never going to hike rates, because if they were going to hike rates, they would be hiking it right now.”
Fed officials think economic growth contributes to inflation, but this betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of how growth works:
“The faster an economy grows, the more prices go down. That’s what economic growth does. That’s why it’s a good thing. It lowers prices. Real economic growth means the economy is producing more stuff, right? That’s the economic growth: we get more goods and more services out of the economy because that’s what a growing economy is supposed to deliver— a higher standard of living. … How can economic growth make prices go up? How can a big increase in the supply of goods and services make those goods and services more expensive? It’s not. It’s going to make them less expensive!”
Peter closes by recounting the history of the U.S. government taking silver out of coins. In the 1960s, Uncle Sam went to a great deal of effort to hide the fact that he was ripping off American citizens:
“Why not just make dimes and quarters with these smooth edges just like pennies and nickels? Because they were counterfeiting the coins! You see, early on, they didn’t tell anybody that they took the silver out. They wanted people to think that the dimes and quarters that they were getting were still made out of silver. That’s why they put the nickel on the copper. That’s why they put mill marks on these copper-clad coins— because they wanted them to look like the coins they used to work with. That’s counterfeit. That is fraud! That is what went on in this country. The government defrauded American citizens out of their lawful silver money.”
In other news, the price of copper has exploded recently. Check out Peter’s Blog for an analysis of copper’s all-time high price.
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The Consequences of California’s New Minimum Wage Law
The law that establishes California’s minimum wage rate at twenty dollars per hour is purportedly aimed at uplifting the state’s working poor. The role of economics is to evaluate such claims through economic theory and empirical evidence. In mainstream economics, commonly taught in introductory college courses, the conventional analysis indicates that such laws may lead to heightened unemployment only if the new minimum wage exceeds the market wage. While this insight is important, it does not tell the full story. This limitation stems from the assumptions inherent in the labor market model, which presume that firms and workers are homogeneous.
However, the real world does not conform to this assumption of homogeneity. Each market participant is different, and each, unlike a stick or a stone, makes numerous sink-or-swim decisions daily. In chapter 4 of his bookMan, Economy, and State, Murray Rothbard breaks down market participants into submarginal, marginal, and supramarginal categories.
Submarginal buyers exit a market when the prevailing price exceeds their willingness or ability to pay, while marginal and supramarginal buyers continue to participate. The latter two are willing and financially capable of paying prices surpassing the market rate. The crucial difference in them lies in the fact that supramarginal buyers are either more willing or more financially resilient to absorb price hikes compared to marginal buyers. An event like a government intervention or an economic shock that drives a price upward will cause marginal buyers to exit, thereby increasing the population of submarginal buyers.
Similarly, submarginal sellers have exited a market when the prevailing price is below their reservation price, while marginal and supramarginal sellers continue to participate. This is a result of the latter two having reservation prices below the market price. The crucial difference lies in the fact that supramarginal sellers have cost advantages due to their incumbency or economies of scale, which results in them having reservation prices that are lower than marginal sellers. Events like a government intervention or economic shocks that drive prices downward cause marginal sellers to exit, thereby increasing the population of submarginal sellers.
In labor markets, firms are buyers of workers’ services, workers are sellers of these services, and the price of the service exchanged is the hourly wage rate paid to workers. In California’s fast-food industry, supramarginal buyers are typically large, low-cost firms capable of substituting labor with automation and benefiting from ample access to low-cost credit. Marginal buyers of labor are often small, high-cost employers operating on tight margins. Submarginal buyers of labor include recently shuttered businesses or entrepreneurs on the cusp of opening their first location.
Supramarginal sellers in this industry are workers whose reservation wages are substantially less than the market wage. Marginal sellers are those whose reservation wage is just below the market wage. Submarginal sellers are those who are not participating in the labor market because the market wage is below their reservation wages. A marginal worker in this market could be young single parents who need a wage sufficient to provide for their families. A supramarginal worker could be individuals in the same situation but without kids, allowing them to accept positions at lower wage rates.
Disaggregating labor supply and demand and conducting thought experiments allow one to understand how California’s twenty dollar minimum wage, which exclusively applies to fast-food restaurants with more than sixty locations, negatively affects poor communities, has no impact on workers in high-income communities, and actually benefits the large, low-cost employers.
In well-to-do localities like Huntington Beach, California’s new minimum wage is roughly equal to the market wage paid to fast-food workers but exceeds that in poor localities like those in Oakland. When the market wage is at least the minimum wage rate, there is no effect on employment or the size of the labor force. However, when the opposite is true, people (submarginal employees) will enter the labor market seeking employment if the new minimum wage rate exceeds their reservation wage. At the same time, small high-cost firms with tight margins (marginal buyers) will exit this labor market if they have no other means to reduce production costs. With the former effect swelling the size of the labor force and the latter shrinking the employment level, unemployment rises in poor communities.
Unemployment in poor communities won’t be the sole consequence of California’s new minimum wage policy. To understand the potential outcomes in areas where prevailing wages significantly trail the twenty dollar minimum, consider this hypothetical: Picture entrepreneurs of color, whether native-born or immigrants, who have built restaurant chains spanning over sixty locations in poor communities, paying the prevailing rate of fourteen dollars per hour. Due to limited purchasing power in these neighborhoods, these eateries price their offerings just high enough to maintain typical economic returns, around 5 percent profit. However, with the introduction of the twenty dollar minimum wage, their labor expenses surge by approximately 43 percent. As hiking prices isn’t feasible in these circumstances, given the aforementioned constraints, restaurant owners are forced to explore cost-saving measures. Unfortunately, this may lead to compromised quality or increased reliance on automation.
However, the feasibility of automation is hampered by elevated interest rates, regional financial institutions facing challenges, and declining support from major banks for small enterprises. Consequently, in a bid to save costs, restaurants might trim staff or turn to processed ingredients over fresh ones. With the Affordable Care Act mandating health coverage for at least 95 percent of full-time employees in businesses with fifty or more full-time equivalents, they may also opt for cheaper part-time labor over higher-cost full-time workers. As these alternatives often result in lower food quality or service standards, residents might dine out less, preferring home-cooked meals over compromised experiences. If these cost-saving measures fall short, regional chains might close locations to shrink their size to below the sixty-location threshold, hampering their expansion into wealthier neighborhoods and hindering their pursuit of the American dream.
The unintended costs of this well-meaning legislation will be borne by residents of low-income California neighborhoods, including reduced job opportunities, unemployment, fewer dining choices, and stunted business growth in areas where these ventures originated. Meanwhile, life in wealthier neighborhoods will remain largely unaffected. Ultimately, the beneficiaries of California’s policy are established, low-cost, highly automated firms like McDonald’s, as the law limits potential competition in the future.
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CNN Analyst Hits Panic Button for Dems Following Massive Trump Bronx Rally: ‘Hispanic Voters Becoming Less Democratic’
A CNN data interpreter gave Democrats bad news following former President Donald Trump’s historic rally in the South Bronx on Thursday, noting Trump appears to be gaining momentum among minorities in the predominantly blue district.
Speaking to Kate Bolduan, CNN Senior Data Reporter Harry Enten explained how the rally represented a demographic shift among voters that should be worrisome for the Biden campaign.
“Look at the Crotona Park area, right? The Crotona Park precinct where that rally was held yesterday,” Enten told Bolduan. “It’s a majority Hispanic precinct, and I want you to take a look essentially at the election results over the last few cycles and what you would see there is essentially see, that look, this is a very Democratic precinct, right? But look at the margin trend line here.”
“You see Obama 94%, Obama 96%, Clinton 92%, Biden won it, but by only 69 points,” Enten continued. “Why is that important? Because look at that. That’s 23 percentage points less than Hillary Clinton won it by. This is a sign of the Hispanic movement that we saw last cycle, right, where we saw, although Hispanics still favored the Democratic candidate in Joe Biden, they were less likely to favor him than they did Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama both times. And it’s not just there that happened. We saw it in Hispanic precincts and counties across the country from southeast Florida, southern Texas, even in the Los Angeles area.”
Enten went on to explain how Biden’s lead over Trump among Hispanics in the Bronx area has dwindled to just 7 points.
“We saw a trend among Hispanic voters from 2016 to 2020, where they became less Democratic,” the data analyst said. “Look at the trend that we’re seeing right now in the polling, right? So, if you look back at Hispanic voters at this point in the 2020 cycle, Joe Biden had a 25 point lead. Look at where that lead is today. It’s just seven points. Donald Trump right now at 44%, if that held, would be the best performance for a Republican candidate among Hispanic voters since George W. Bush back in 2004.”
“And this is part of a larger trend line, Kate, that we’re seeing among nonwhite voters, we see among black voters as well – we’ve discussed that on this program before – whereby they’re much more favorable to Donald Trump than they were four years ago. And of course, Donald Trump did better amongst both of those groups in 2020 versus how he did in 2016.”
Enten went on to explain that if Biden wants to offset Trump’s support from the Hispanic community, he will need to court white liberal voters in the Great Lakes region.
“If you look nationally, Hispanics make up about 10% of likely voters,” he explained. “All right, so where do they make up a lower percentage of that? They make him up in the Great Lake battleground states … 3% in Michigan, 2% of Pennsylvania, 4% in Wisconsin. We have been harping over and over and over again that Joe Biden’s best path to reelection is to run through the Great Lakes and polling and results that we saw like in Crotona Park in 2020 and the polling that we see in 2024 just reinforce that.”
“He [Biden] is going to probably do best where white voters make up the vast majority of voters,” Enten described. “He still has a path to 270 at this point, even though he’s doing poorly, more poorly amongst Hispanics and black voters than he did four years ago because his numbers seem to be holding with white voters who make up the vast majority of voters in those Great Lake battleground states.”
Covering Trump’s rally on the ground Thursday, a CNN correspondent admitted the size of the audience was a bad indicator for Biden, saying, “It’s certainly a bigger crowd than I think Democrats would like to see, particularly given this is one of the bluest counties in the entire country!”
Even CNN is admitting President Trump’s rally in the Bronx was a massive success:
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) May 24, 2024
“Certainly a bigger crowd than I think Democrats would like to see, particularly given this is one of the bluest counties in the entire country!” ? pic.twitter.com/XScfuQmnVa
As Biden grows more decrepit by the day, the legacy media is seeing the writing on the wall and panic is beginning to set in.
Don Lemon Doubles Down: ‘People Were Being Selfish’ By Not Masking & Getting Jabbed During Covid
Disgraced CNN anchor Don Lemon joined the “Fullsend Podcast” this week where he doubled down on his pro-Covid shot and masking stances he pushed on millions of Americans during the pandemic.
Asked about people like Chris Cuomo backtracking on the efficacy of the Covid jabs and medicines like ivermectin, Lemon said, “This whole argument about vaccines is a little weird to me because I think people are Monday morning quarterbacking.”
Don Lemon Continues to Defend Vaccine & Mask Mandates: ‘I Think People Were Being Selfish’
— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) May 24, 2024
“I think people were being selfish about that. If you don’t get the vaccine, then don’t get the vaccine but don’t expect to be able to do and go places where people who got the vaccine… pic.twitter.com/XxxnvpCB6b
Elaborating, Lemon defended the clot shot pushers by saying, “This was a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic and people didn’t know. I think we have to give the people who were in charge, including the Trump administration, a little grace because nobody knew how to deal with this.”
He continued to claim health officials and politicians “were doing what they thought was best to save the most amount of people.”
Of course, plenty of medical experts, alternative media outlets and some politicians were aware of the dangerous mRNA shots, the lack of protection provided by masks and the benefits of drugs like ivermectin during the pandemic.
We also now know the government colluded with social media companies to suppress information about those issued during the pandemic.
Next, Lemon suggested people who didn’t mask or didn’t get the experimental shots were being “selfish” despite the fact they’ve now been proven right.
“Instead of being selfish for themselves, they should have been doing what was best for our fellow man,” he said.
“I’m not gonna say, ‘Masks are stupid,’ because I’m not selfish,” he virtue signaled. “So, I think that people who were questioning the use of masks, even in the moment, were being a bit selfish.”
Meanwhile, there have been dozens of studies showing masks are not only ineffective at preventing the transmission of COVID-19, but that they can actually make the wearer sick.
Sounding like the ignorant shill that he is, Lemon told the podcast hosts, “So, I believe in medicine, I believe in science and I believe that my government is looking out for and trying to do the best for me.”
When one of the show’s hosts noted the media was demonizing people who chose to pass on the shots, Lemon claimed the media wasn’t shaming people.
Without a hint of self-awareness or irony, Lemon then shamed those who didn’t get the jabs, saying, “I don’t know if the media was shaming people, I think people were being selfish. If you don’t want to get the vaccine, don’t get the vaccine, but don’t expect to be able to do and go places…”
Another “Fullsend” host interjected, sarcastically adding, “and work, and make a living, right?”
Lemon responded, “Everyone was working from home. People weren’t at work. If someone in my office didn’t want to get the vaccine, then I would tell them to work from home.”
Both podcast hosts told Lemon they didn’t get the vaccine.
It’s worth noting Lemon’s employer during the pandemic, CNN, fired three employees for refusing to get jabbed.
Highlights: Trump’s Historic Bronx Rally Turned Into A Patriot Party!
Donald Trump held a massive rally in New York City’s The Bronx on Thursday in what will go down as a historic political event.
The 45th President ventured where few Republicans have gone and was met by a nearly 30,000 strong crowd of adoring fans and supporters.
Trump’s overall message was one of unity and peace, explaining he’s running to lead “all Americans.”
Donald Trump in The Bronx: “It doesn’t matter whether you’re black or brown or white or whatever the hell color you are, it doesn’t matter. We are all Americans.”
— ALX ?? (@alx) May 24, 2024
pic.twitter.com/dr4iINPL2Q
The presidential frontrunner also warned of the establishment agenda to flood America with illegal aliens “from all over the world” who may be hostile to the country.
“They are physically fit. They’re 19-25. Almost every one is a male and they look like fighting age. I think they’re building an army. 29,000 people over the last… I think they want to get us from within! I think they’re building an army… They have tents and gas-fired stoves. This is not like an illegal immigrant, they’re building something. We’re gonna end all that stuff,” he told the huge audience.
? Keep your powder dry patriots. Donald Trump is warning everyone…
— MJTruthUltra (@MJTruthUltra) May 23, 2024
They are Building an Army! They want to get us from Within!!
They’re Building Something!
• Millions of illegals
• They’re all young
• Most are males
• They are of fighting agehttps://t.co/Zid32ObrJU pic.twitter.com/J7VqZ5jCYs
See the enormous gathering for yourself:
?WOW – EVER WONDER WHAT OVER 30,000 PEOPLE AT A TRUMP RALLY LOOKS LIKE?
— Bo Loudon (@BoLoudon) May 23, 2024
OVER 111,000 PEOPLE ARE WATCHING RIGHTFUL PRESIDENT TRUMP’S BRONX RALLY ON RUMBLE ALONE, AS WELL!
Amazing footage from @DanScavino!
It sure would be a shame if this went viral and blew up in AOC’s face! pic.twitter.com/7SfbcZB7Pp
Patriots in the Bronx are ready for President Trump?
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) May 23, 2024
pic.twitter.com/wJVBqV92AU
I’m rocking in Da Bronx with thousands Trump supporters. pic.twitter.com/ryZCz1F453
— I Meme Therefore I Am ?? (@ImMeme0) May 23, 2024
There were some interesting moments captured on film before the speech, with a troll attempting to bait a Trump supporter into a racial conversation, which caused the MAGA guy to start chanting, “We want Trump,” with a group of young black men.
She called him a racist for being a Trump Supporter…. And this happened
— MJTruthUltra (@MJTruthUltra) May 23, 2024
????????
pic.twitter.com/UcBIOdoGX0
A music video shoot even broke out during the rally!
Da Bronx Is Rock With Trump!?? pic.twitter.com/TNkpzk6Bmk
— I Meme Therefore I Am ?? (@ImMeme0) May 23, 2024
Trump brought some locals onstage to speak to the crowd.
Ex-New York State Senator Reverend Ruben Diaz called New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D) a “false prophet” because she suggested God would make it rain during the rally and it turned out to be “a beautiful day.”
OUCH! Democrat & former NY state senator, Rev. Diaz calls out @AOC as a FALSE PROPHET after she predicted God would rain out Trump’s Bronx Rally & it
— Melissa Tate (@TheRightMelissa) May 24, 2024
Turned out to be beautiful day ??? pic.twitter.com/rcJDZNIiTu
Activist Madeline Brame unloaded on the illegal immigrant crisis wrecking U.S. cities.
“Get rid of AOC, vote her a$$ out!”
— Paul A. Szypula ?? (@Bubblebathgirl) May 23, 2024
Blexit activist Madeline Brame right now is crushing it in the Bronx ahead of Trump’s speech.pic.twitter.com/yNwxTyg71G
Perhaps the most hilarious moment came when Trump told a pair of local rappers he wants to get a gold grill on his teeth.
Trump wants to get a rapper grill ??? pic.twitter.com/hvIa8ZK95Q
— Old Row (@OldRowOfficial) May 24, 2024
Bronx kids were extremely excited to see one of the rappers, Sheff G.
BREAKING: New York kids cannot believe that popular rapper, Sheff G, has arrived to Trump’s rally in the Bronx. WATCH pic.twitter.com/pazTOQmIDF
— Simon Ateba (@simonateba) May 23, 2024
Media outlets and independent reporters talked with attendees about why they support Trump:
??DEVELOPING: What’s happening in the Bronx will be in history books I can’t believe it. Trump is HIM. THE FIRST MAN TO END THE BLACK DEMOCRAT PLANTATION I’M SPEECHLESS HE IS THE ONE! pic.twitter.com/wL7KrEuHNf
— Dom Lucre | Breaker of Narratives (@dom_lucre) May 23, 2024
One man claimed other presidents have come to The Bronx in the past, but that Trump is the first one who “came to the hood.”
“From what I know this is the first time a President has actually came to the hood”
— Savanah Hernandez (@sav_says_) May 24, 2024
A Bronx resident applauds Trump for coming to the Bronx stating that he knows previous Presidents have come, but they’ve never come to the “hood hood” like Trump has pic.twitter.com/MerbMm8epn
Another white supremacist from the Bronx is supporting President Trump. pic.twitter.com/nDxyGROM5E
— I Meme Therefore I Am ?? (@ImMeme0) May 24, 2024
Voters in the Bronx have a message for @AOC…
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) May 24, 2024
“Everybody’s here for TRUMP!”
“I am a Democrat — and I belong here.”
“She has done NOTHING for the Bronx.” pic.twitter.com/EJUBADvKpz
Trump supporters are most amazing people. The Bronx was rocking today. pic.twitter.com/6fe8QU5PO9
— I Meme Therefore I Am ?? (@ImMeme0) May 24, 2024
Watching Democrats having meltdown over Trump Rally in the Bronx is glorious!! pic.twitter.com/Shcrwfscif
— I Meme Therefore I Am ?? (@ImMeme0) May 24, 2024
Even CNN had to admit the huge rally spells trouble for Democrats, with a reporter saying, “It’s certainly a bigger crowd than I think Democrats would like to see, particularly given this is one of the bluest counties in the entire country!”
Even CNN is admitting President Trump’s rally in the Bronx was a massive success:
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) May 24, 2024
“Certainly a bigger crowd than I think Democrats would like to see, particularly given this is one of the bluest counties in the entire country!” ? pic.twitter.com/XScfuQmnVa
Mainstream media does not want the public to see Trump’s true popularity among citizens of every race, religion, class and any other demographic they use to divide the nation.