NYC mayor pleads for help: 'Where in the hell is the federal government?'

From the March 20 edition of CNN’s “CNN Newsroom”:

BILL DE BLASIO, Mayor of New York City (D): Now, whether we would like it or not, we’re the epicenter. And I have made repeated appeals to the federal government to get us basic medical supplies and there’s no meaningful response.

 

I’ve appealed to the president to activate the United States military. That could actually — the one force in this nation, Poppy, that could save us, because they could mobilize quickly, effectively to get us medical supplies, personnel. They could get the supplies that are elsewhere in the country here in record time.

 

We know what they can do in war time — they can do it in peacetime. And you know where they are? They’re at their bases right now because the president of the United States, the commander-in-chief, has not given the order.

 

And I got people right now, Poppy, in my city – and a lot of them are older people, a lot of them are people who are suffering from other diseases. If help doesn’t come we’re going to lose people who should not die.

 

People will die who should not die. Because in two or three weeks my hospitals — some of the finest in the nation — will run out of ventilators, surgical masks, other protective gear, all the things that we need to run a hospital and provide care.

 

And it will endanger our health care workers. And they’re showing up, Poppy. zthey keep coming to work.

 

POPPY HARLOW, CNN: I know.

 

DE BLASIO: And retirees, we asked retirees to come forward from the health care field, and over two thousand already in 48 hours have said, “We volunteer. We’re coming back to do this work to protect people.”

 

But where the hell is the federal government in the middle of the biggest crisis we’ve seen in generations?

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.