Jeff Landry: ‘If You Want to Lay Blame’ for Coronavirus, ‘Point Fingers at China’

The coronavirus pandemic provides an opportunity to restore American manufacturing and China should be held accountable for the crisis, said Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry on Wednesday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily with host Alex Marlow.

In a column entitled, “‘Made in America’ solutions will defeat COVID-19 and stop China’s economic invasion,” Landry called for regulatory reform to incentivize renewal of American manufacturing, particularly pharmaceutical and medical goods.

Landry wrote, “This is not a natural disaster, but a real pandemic caused by open borders, the misinformation of foreign governments, and our dilapidated regulatory and legal climates which have forced our medical supply chain to be based overseas in places like China.”

Many conservatives and Republicans oppose the status quo of U.S.-China economic relations, Landry said, describing American dependence on Chinese exports as a national security vulnerability.

Rejection of China’s growing control of global manufacturing “is what propelled Donald Trump into the presidency,” assessed Landry. He added, ‘Now America — all Americans — is understanding the weakness in those actions over the last couple of decades, when we realized that we don’t manufacture some of the most necessary items that we need at this time.”

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The U.S.-China economic relationship needs “recalibration,” determined Landry. He advised Congress to “support manufacturing” of “vital components that we need right here in the United States.” He also pointed out that China was who should be held responsible for the coronavirus instead of the partisan finger-pointing occurring in America.

“I think it’s irresponsible to start pointing fingers unless you want to point fingers at China, which is where the virus started,” he noted. “To me, if you want to lay blame, that’s where you should lay blame. Right now, we should all be working together, trying to find ways in which we can both combat the spread of the virus and try to make sure the patients who get it recover.”

Landry said, “We’ve got great talent. We’ve got a great workforce. It’s just a matter of getting that workforce channeled into the right manufacturing capacity.”

Landry concluded by highlighting the centrality of truckers to America’s domestic supply chain.

“I’d also like to take a shout out to all the truck drivers out there,” Landry stated. “When you think about the amount of time and effort those men and women are putting in to ensure that our grocery store shelves are full, [and] to the farmers that grow food. Everyone who’s in that vital supply chain that’s keeping America still working and still fed and still comfortable, hats off to them.”

Breitbart News Daily broadcasts live on SiriusXM Patriot 125 weekdays from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern.

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