Political Quotes

“Reserving the right to object, Mr. President, first of all, I am largely sympathetic to the intent of this. I think all of us are exhausted by COVID. Fortunately, we are really coming out of it. It has been exhausting, so I am ultimately hopeful that the administration--when this public health emergency is ended, which we expect will be very, very soon, that the vaccine mandate will go with it. Secondly, I am a big fan of Lynyrd Skynyrd's, so that is a pretty persuasive argument, but I don't regard him as infallible. Third, Vermont is a tourist State as well. Our skiing is a little tougher for, you know, tougher folks. You have that soft powder out there in Utah. But tourism really matters to us. So the concerns the Senator from Utah is expressing--I am sympathetic. Let me state the reason for my objection. This public health emergency is going to end. The administration is actively, day in and day out, in the process of taking the steps that are going to unwind this. My view is that this is an area where Executive responsibility has to be carried out in an orderly way, not just to address this question of ending the vaccine mandate, but there are other matters that are affected if this public health emergency is abruptly ended that may do harm to Vermont. Let me just be very specific. The telehealth provisions that were in legislation that allowed us to get access to healthcare should not end when the public health emergency ends.…”