mcsally.house.gov

Martha McSally

Sen. Martha McSally on Tuesday told a conservative media outlet that China was reckless and lied about the extent of the coronavirus early this year.

In a Fox Business interview released by her campaign, McSally repeated misinformation by President Donald Trump and others that the U.S. didn’t know about the implications of the coronavirus due to a cover-up by China.

“We’re learning more about this virus every day and unfortunately because of China’s communist cover-up of it we could have learned all of this back in January,” she said. “So, as our experts understand the virus more and more we’ll be able to make more targeted decisions moving forward.”

McSally also called for protection of frontline health care workers and nursing home staff as well as widespread antigen testing.

Earlier this month, she also called for the resignation of the director-general of the World Health Organization according to a press release. 

President Trump in January was briefed by U.S. intelligence officials that the coronavirus outbreak was worse than China admitted to at the time and he ignored the information, saying in a Feb. 28 rally, “Now the Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus” and, "This is their new hoax."

Publishing of the coronavirus genome was posted on Jan. 11, 2020/

EDITOR'S NOTE: The story has been updated to clarify President Trump's comments.

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