saturday, april 4 , 2020. the washington post eZ M2 A
the coronavirus pandemic
ment.
“This is quite a scandal,” said
Karl Lauterbach, a German par-
liamentarian and health scien-
tist. “We were relying on the deliv-
ery.... It’s an international crisis,
and it’s important that we can
rely on each other.”
In Brazil, the health minister
this week said some of the coun-
try’s purchases from China fell
through after the United States
started transporting planeloads
of equipment from China.
“The United States has ordered
23 huge airplanes to China to
bring back the materials that
they’d acquired,” Brazilian health
minister Luiz Henrique mandetta
told reporters. “our purchases —
which we expected would bolster
supplies — many fell through.”
He said it’s likely that Brazil
had been outbid for the supplies,
and that the Chinese reneged on
the agreements.
Brazil announced Thursday
that after distributing the last of
its medical supplies, the health
ministry’s reserves have now
been completely depleted.
“In another week, we won’t
have any more masks,” s aid Alex-
andre Te lles, the president of rio
de Janeiro’s doctors’ union. “Ev-
eryone is very scared by the lack
of protective equipment.”
In france, a number of regional
officials told the Libération news-
paper that they had ordered
masks from Chinese suppliers,
only to be outbid by American
officials at the last minute.
“I had found a stock of masks
available, but the Americans out-
bid,” said Valérie Pécresse, the
president of the Paris region’s
governmental council.
The United States emphatical-
ly denied the allegations. “The
United States government has
not purchased any masks intend-
ed for delivery from China to
france,” t he U.S. Embassy in Paris
wrote in a statement. “reports to
the contrary are completely
false.”
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]amanda Coletta in toronto, James
Mcauley in Paris and Luisa beck in
berlin contributed to this report.is related to the U.S. government’s
ban on mask exports.”
“We consider this an act of
modern piracy,” he said, calling
on the United States to “comply
with international rules.” “ This is
not how you deal with transatlan-
tic partners. Even in times of
global crisis, wild west methods
shouldn’t rule.”
The statement did not name
the company involved, saying
only that it was a U.S. firm, but
German media reports said the
consignment was ordered from
3m.
Berlin mayor michael müller,
who like Geisel is a member of the
left-wing Social Democrats,
called the action “inhumane and
unacceptable.”
The German federal govern-
ment did not respond to a request
to comment on friday. The U.S.
State Department also did not
respond to a request for com-plained in an interview with fox
Business that China had moved to
“nationalize, effectively, 3m, our
company... to prevent them
from sending us any stuff.”
In response, 3m said it has a
“regionalized” manufacturing
structure. “for example, the ma-
jority of our products made in
China are sold in China,” a
spokeswoman said.
German officials on friday
were stinging in their criticism of
the Trump administration after a
consignment of face masks that
they said was ordered and paid
for by the Berlin police was di-
verted en route from China.
Andreas Geisel, Berlin’s minis-
ter for the interior, said the deliv-
ery made it as far as Bangkok
before being “confiscated.” In a
statement, he said he couldn’t
provide further details of what
happened at the airport but “we
are currently assuming that thisproportion” of the company’s U.S.
production.
“Ceasing all export of respira-
tors produced in the United
States would likely cause other
countries to retaliate and do the
same, as some have already done,”
3m said in a statement.
The company said it had “se-
cured approval from China” this
week to export 10 million masks
to the United States from 3m’s
factories in China. That followed
a Trump administration request
that 3m increase imports from its
overseas factories, the company
said.
Presidential trade adviser Pe-
ter Navarro said this week that
the administration has “had
some issues making sure that all
of the production that 3m does
around the world — enough of it
is coming back here to the right
places.”
In february, Navarro com-appropriate.”
3m CEo michael roman said
the company would comply with
the order.
“The narrative we aren’t doing
everything we can as a company
is just not true,” he said in an
interview with CNBC, noting that
3m has doubled its global produc-
tion of N95 masks since coronavi-
rus hit the headlines in January.
roman also cautioned that ad-
ministration requests to stop
mask exports from the United
States, and to divert production
from other countries, could have
serious trade and humanitarian
implications.
3m is an important supplier to
Canada and Latin America, and
“the sole provider in many cases
of the respiratory protection for
health-care workers in countries
around the world,” he said, add-
ing that exports to Canada and
Latin America represent a “smalland france complained that the
United States was outbidding
them in the global marketplace
for critical medical supplies.
At a friday evening briefing,
President Trump said he was in-
voking the DPA again to stop the
export of “critical medical items
by unscrupulous actors,” whom
he did not identify.
The developments under-
scored the huge pressure the
Trump administration faces as
the number of coronavirus infec-
tions in the United States contin-
ues to skyrocket a nd state officials
and health-care workers continue
to complain of worrying shortag-
es of medical supplies at a time
when most of the rest of the world
is also battling the contagion.
Canadian Prime minister Jus-
tin Trudeau said his government
has been “forcefully” reminding
American counterparts that trade
“goes both ways across the bor-
der.”
Thousands of nurses in Wind-
sor, ontario, he noted, travel to
Detroit each day to work in hospi-
tals there. Several of them have
since tested positive for covid-19,
the disease caused by the novel
coronavirus, which has infected
more than 12,000 people in mich-
igan as of friday evening.
“These are things that Ameri-
cans rely on,” Trudeau said, “and
it would be a mistake to create
blockages or reduce the amount
of back-and-forth trade of essen-
tial goods and services, including
medical goods, across our bor-
der.”
Trump announced late Thurs-
day he was invoking the Defense
Production Act in relation to 3m,
suggesting it was for punitive
reasons. “We hit 3m hard today
after seeing what they were doing
with their masks,” he tweeted.
“... Big surprise to many in gov-
ernment as to what they were
doing - will have a big price to
pay!”
on friday, Trump added he was
“not happy with 3m,” without
elaborating.
In an executive order, the
White House said it would use the
act to acquire “the number of
N-95 respirators that the [fEmA]
administrator determines to be
masks from a
Allies say U.S. rush for supplies leaves them high and dry
Jabin botsford/the Washington Post
President Trump said Friday he was invoking the Defense Production act to stop “unscrupulous actors” from exporting medical supplies.BY ELLEN NAKASHIMA,
JOSH DAWSEY
AND SHANE HARRISPresident Trump notified Con-
gress friday evening that he in-
tends in 30 days to fire the
intelligence community inspec-
tor general, the official who alert-
ed lawmakers to a whistleblower
complaint last September that
was at the center of allegations
that led to the president’s im-
peachment.
The move to remove michael
Atkinson comes as the adminis-
tration is struggling to cope with
a coronavirus pandemic that has
killed thousands of Americans.
The whistleblower complaint
centered on Trump’s efforts last
summer to pressure the Ukraini-
an government to undertake in-
vestigations of former vice presi-
dent Joe Biden and his son Hunt-
er, moves that would undermine
a likely rival to Trump in his
reelection bid.
Trump informed lawmakers in
a letter late friday night that he
was removing Atkinson. “It is
vital that I have the fullest confi-
dence in the appointees serving
as inspectors general,’’ he wrote
in the letter, a copy of which was
obtained by The Washington
Post. “That is no longer the case
with regard to this inspector
general.”
Trump has faulted Atkinson
repeatedly for letting the com-
plaint reach Congress and also as
enabling what he has called a
“hoax” of an impeachment, ad-
ministration officials said.
He has weighed for months
removing Atkinson, whom he
picked for the job in late 2017, but
has been periodically talked out
of it.
The White House did not im-
mediately respond to a request
for comment about the reason for
or the timing of the firing.Trump’s action drew immediate
condemnation from senior Dem-
ocratic lawmakers.
“Whether it’s Lt. Col. Vind-
man, Captain Crozier, or Intelli-
gence Community Inspector
General michael Atkinson: Presi-
dent Trump fires people for tell-
ing the truth,” Senate minority
Leader Charles E. Schumer
(D-N.Y.) said in a statement. “mi-
chael Atkinson is a man of integ-
rity who has served our nation for
almost two decades. Being fired
for having the courage to speak
truth to power makes him a
patriot.”
Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman
was a Ukraine specialist on the
White House National Security
Council who testified during the
House impeachment about lis-
tening in to Trump’s telephone
conversation with Ukrainian
President Volodymyr Zelensky.
He was removed from his White
House post days after Trump’sacquittal by the Senate.
Capt. Brett Crozier was the
commander of the aircraft carri-
er USS Theodore roosevelt who
was removed after the leaking of
a blunt letter he wrote to his
superiors about what he saw as
insufficient measures to fight a
coronavirus outbreak aboard the
vessel.
“In the midst of a national
emergency, it is unconscionable
that the president is once again
attempting to undermine the in-
tegrity of the intelligence com-
munity by firing yet another in-
telligence official simply for do-
ing his job,” said Senate Intelli-
gence Committee Vice Chairman
mark r. Warner (D-Va.). “We
should all be deeply disturbed by
ongoing attempts to politicize
the nation’s intelligence agen-
cies.”
House Intelligence Committee
Chairman Adam B. Schiff (D-Ca-
lif.) called the move “yet anotherblatant attempt by the president
to gut the independence of the
intelligence community and re-
taliate against those who dare to
expose presidential wrongdoing.”
Said Schiff: “A t a time when our
country i s dealing with a national
emergency and needs people in
the intelligence community to
speak truth to power, the presi-
dent’s d ead of night decision puts
our country and national security
at even greater risk.”
Atkinson, a respected govern-
ment lawyer with more than 20
years’ experience, was informed
friday night that Trump intend-
ed to fire him and was placed on
administrative leave effective im-
mediately, according to a con-
gressional aide who spoke on the
condition of anonymity because
he was not authorized to speak
for the record. The statute techni-
cally requires that both intelli-
gence committees be notified by
the president 30 days before theeffective date of the inspector
general’s removal. But placing
Atkinson on administrative leave
effectively sidelines him immedi-
ately, the aide said.
“The firing of Atkinson, who
was appointed by President
Trump, is nothing but a delayed
retaliatory action taken against
an independent IG for his proper
handling o f a whistleblower com-
plaint,” said mark Zaid, the law-
yer who previously represented
the intelligence community em-
ployee who alleged that Trump
had solicited Ukraine’s interfer-
ence in the 2020 presidential
election. “This action is disgrace-
ful and undermines the integrity
of the whistleblower system,”
Zaid said. “It is time GoP mem-
bers of the Senate stand up for
the rule of law and speak out
against this president.”
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[email protected]Trump to fire intelligence watchdog at center of impeachment episode
wapo.st/medicalmysteriesS137-6xRead “Medical Mysteries,” Tuesdays in Health & Science.She had a loud,
nonstop crunching
noise in her head...
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