OPINION:
With more than 170,000 Americans having lost their lives to the China virus, President Trump continues to stand up to China and fight for American families. It’s shameful that Joe Biden tries to politicize the virus, while Mr. Trump is working overtime to “save lives and defeat the pandemic.” While Mr. Trump took action back in January to halt travel from China into America which health scientists agreed saved countless lives, Mr. Biden criticized the life-saving measure and called it xenophobic.
Mr. Trump has made clear that wearing a mask is “patriotic.” But the gold standard for respiratory protection, the coveted FDA-designated N95, remains in short supply because China and other bad actors are flooding the U.S. with knockoff products or promises they can’t keep.
All across our nation, entire manufacturing systems built by American companies like 3M, Honeywell and Prestige Ameritech Ltd. are being built to produce more masks.
But their scarcity and a fear of infection have enticed many to dive into a Wild West mask marketplace as manufacturers or brokers.
Many of those middlemen disappeared as fast as they were created, securing billions in dubious procurement deals with desperate public health agencies before failing in often spectacular fashion. These fly-by-night operators hurt American communities just like the virus itself.
One firm received a half-a-billion dollar deposit from the state of California, only to have the funds returned hours later after bank officials took a closer look at the just-formed medical supply company. Their masks were about as real as their claims of experience.
But not all these middlemen were so anonymous.
“Shark Tank” TV show co-host Daymond John also dove in via The Shark Group with a $7 million deal with the Florida Department of Emergency Management. Despite Mr. John having a manufacturing background, this contract was not to make masks. But, rather, to broker a transaction for 1 million of the hard-to-find N95 masks, despite not being an authorized distributor. The deal ultimately fell through.
Florida was already reeling from several high-profile procurement deals that had fallen through. An escrow agreement was signed on March 25 weeks later when the masks failed to materialize. Gov. Ron DeSantis is doing a tremendous job, and I applaud the state of Florida for defending both Florida families and taxpayers by pursuing theses fraudsters.
3M has reportedly filed a series of suits against firms that use the company’s name or engage in price gouging. They have their work cut out for them.
But 3M is a company whose innovations gave us recording tape for music and television, helped us get to the moon and made simple daily tasks easier with products from Scotch tape to Post-It Notes.
3M has been doing its patriotic duty, maximizing production capacity to meet demand that shows no end in sight. While they have doubled global production since January and are projected to be able to produce 2 billion annually by the end of this year, it’s still not enough.
Mr. Trump has applauded 3M for its leadership, including entering into a Defense Production Act agreement in the early months of the pandemic, which helped accelerate both production and imports and made more than 55 million masks available every month.
3M is also maintaining the company’s long-standing pricing schedule and is collaborating with the White House and key pandemic response agencies to get personal protective equipment, including N95 masks, air-purifying respirators and other gear to health care workers, first responders and millions of American men and women.
While 3M, which employs more than 350 American patriots in my home state of Arkansas, and other U.S. suppliers are working overtime, they cannot yet produce enough masks to meet ongoing demand for respirators and other PPE equipment.
To put American families first, Congress and the federal government should promote harmonized procurement practices across all agencies and support coordinated PPE distribution to all states, territories and tribes to ensure that manufacturers and distributors are prioritizing public health.
Most importantly, Washington needs to stand up to the Chinese Communist Party’s role in hampering our response by weeding out and punishing those flooding the U.S. market with fake Chinese masks. The responsibility China bears for lying about the virus and letting it spread to the world will stick to China like Scotch tape sticks to paper.
The great American comeback has only just begun. Under Mr. Trump’s leadership, we will defeat the China virus and hold those accountable at home and abroad for the chaos from which they’ve tried to profit.
• Mike Huckabee was the 44th governor of Arkansas and a 2016 Republican candidate for president. He is currently host of “Huckabee” on TBN and a Fox News Contributor.
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