President Joe Biden is urging faith leaders to assist the administration with fighting vaccine hesitancy.
“They’re going to listen to your words, more than they are me, as president of the United States,“ Biden said during a call with faith leaders.
Biden acknowledged faith leaders have been “critical partners to us in our COVID response.”
He called on them to “spread the word, let people in our communities and your community know how important is to get everyone vaccinated when it’s their turn. And soon they’ll just be able to just line up and just get their name on a list.”
The president warned “people are getting too cavalier with traveling a great deal, gathering in larger crowds, and people aren’t wearing their masks. Aren’t on social distancing. Aren’t washing their hands.”
Mentioning the spike in cases, Biden called fighting vaccine hesitancy “the godly thing to do.”
After Dr. Rochelle Walensky, head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned of “impending doom,” Biden urged governors and mayors to reinstate mask mandates, as IJR reported.
“I’m reiterating my call for every governor, mayor, and local leader to maintain and reinstate the mask mandate. Please, this is not politics,” Biden said. “Reinstate the mandate if you let it down. Businesses should require masks as well.”
Biden also said he believes some states should pause their reopening efforts, as IJR reported.
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) defended loosening restrictions and suggested her state could slow the spread using masks and urging residents to get vaccinated.
“We’re going gangbusters on the vaccines and that’s where people need to have their personal responsibility — following the protocol and getting themselves vaccinated,” she said during a CNN appearance on Wednesday.
More than 200 million vaccines have been delivered and over 153 million have been administered.