President Donald Trump Acknowledges COVID-19 Vaccine Not Available Widely Until April 2021, Provides Aid to Puerto Rico, Calls Mail-In Voting “Scam”

President Donald Trump, at a press conference on Friday, Sept. 18, acknowledged a Covid-19 vaccine would not be available widely in the United States until April 2021, contradicting himself from an earlier statement.

While the novel coronavirus originated in China, he continued to call the virus the “China virus,” a phrase some call racist. He also claimed falsely presidential candidate Joe Biden had antivaccine theories.

The president also announced $13 billion of aid was being sent to Puerto Rico to repair the electrical grid, although previously the president had said the island did not deserve any aid because of corruption. When asked by a reporter why the aid was not given three years ago, the president responded by blaming the Democrats. The president also later, when asked a similar question about why the aid was being provided now, added it was to return to Puerto Rico a pharmaceutical manufacturing industry. Judy Woodruff during the PBS Newshour, a few hours later pointed out Puerto Rico is important to many voters in Florida.

Through the press conference he read from a prepared statement. Near the end of press conference when he responding to reporters’ questions, he claimed mail-in voting was a scam without providing any evidence. He tried to make a distinction between solicited and unsolicited mail-in ballots, like he has done before. When he declared the press conference over, a reporter shouted to him that if he won the election would he still consider mail-in voting a scam. The president ignored the reporter.