President Joe Biden is urging Americans to get the COVID-19 vaccine, asking them, âWhatâs the big deal?â
During an interview with WHIO TV 7, the outletâs John Bedell noted Bidenâs vaccine mandates have âsuffered some setbacks in court recently.â
He continued, âFederal judges have halted three of those COVID vaccine mandates. Are you going to back down, or are you going to continue to fight those in court?â
Biden told Bedell he plans on fighting the lawsuits filed against him.
The president explained, âThis is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Not the vaccinated, the unvaccinated. Thatâs the problem. Everybody talks about freedom about not to have a shot or have a test. Well, guess what?â
He added, âHow about patriotism? How about making sure that youâre vaccinated so you do not spread the disease to anyone else? What about that? Whatâs the big deal?â
Watch his comments below:
Bidenâs comments come just a week after the Senate voted to overturn his vaccine or testing mandate for private businesses that have more than 100 employees.
Democratic Sens. Jon Tester of Montana and Joe Manchin of West Virginia voted alongside 50 Republicans.
As CNN noted, the multiple lawsuits filed against the mandate have been reassigned to an Ohio federal appeals court.
Manchin said in a statement, âI have long said we should incentivize, not penalize, private employers whose responsibility it is to protect their employees from COVID-19.â
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) argued the effort to challenge the mandate is an âanti-science, anti-vaccine vote.â
âIf their plans go into effect, Covid will linger longer, and the chance of new variants and new more dangerous variants occurring increases,â Schumer said.
He continued, âIt is anti-science, anti-common sense, it makes no sense.â
In November, a flash survey of 300 businesses showed 60% of companies are moving forward with vaccine mandates.
