None of the clips Fox aired showed President Joe Biden expressing positive sentiments about people being fired.
Fox News' Brian Kilmeade falsely claimed on Friday that President Joe Biden was proud people were being fired for not complying with vaccine mandates. His guest on "Fox & Friends," Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), agreed and said Biden didn't care about public health.
During a discussion of a speech the president made on Thursday, Kilmeade introduced a quick series of clips of Biden speaking taken out of context with the words, "The president, inexplicably, proud of how people getting fired for not getting vaccinated. Listen to this."
None of the clips Fox aired showed Biden expressing positive sentiments about people being fired for not complying with vaccine mandates. Fox has a history of presenting out of context clips and misinforming its audience as to the true content.
In response, Scott said, "The big story is: Joe Biden is firing people. Joe Biden is telling people, Hey, look, if you're concerned about your health I don't care, that's what he's saying. We're going to make sure that you get fired because you're not doing what I tell you to do."
That is not what Biden said.
In his speech, Biden noted that while he has "tried everything in my power to get people vaccinated":
From Biden's speech:
But even after all those efforts, we still had more than a quarter of people in the United States who were eligible for vaccinations but didn’t get the shot.
And we know there is no other way to beat the pandemic than to get the vast majority of Americans vaccinated. It’s as simple as that.
[...]
So, today, I’m calling on more employers to act. My message is: Require your employees to get vaccinated. With vaccinations, we’re going to beat this pandemic finally. Without them, we face endless months of chaos in our hospitals, damage to our economy, and anxiety in our schools, and empty restaurants, and much less commerce.
Polling has shown that a majority of Americans support vaccine mandates. A poll conducted Sept. 9-13 by Monmouth University found that majorities support vaccine mandates for health care workers, teachers, federal employees and contractors, and school children age 12 and older.
At companies and organizations that have instituted mandates, there has been a marked increase in vaccination.
United Airlines announced a mandate on Aug. 6, telling workers they had to be vaccinated or lose their jobs. The company now reports that 99.5% of its employees are vaccinated. Similar results of 90% or higher vaccination rates have been reported by Tyson Foods, the NBA, and New York City public schools.
Experts say that the Biden administration is on firm legal ground in pushing for vaccine mandates.
Despite this, Fox News has kept up a consistent attack on the process even though the network itself has instituted vaccination rules, requiring employees to provide proof either of vaccination or of weekly negative COVID test results.
Republican lawmakers continue to demonize coronavirus safety measures, as governors and members of Congress claim that health mandates are unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court has ruled on the constitutionality of vaccine mandates. Its decision in the 1905 case of Jacobson v. Massachusetts, regarding smallpox vaccines in that instance, noted, "It is within the police power of a State to enact a compulsory vaccination law, and it is for the legislature, and not for the courts, to determine in the first instance whether vaccination is or is not the best mode for the prevention of smallpox and the protection of the public health."
Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.
