Speaking to business owners Wednesday, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott condemned public health “lockdowns” to slow the spread of COVID-19 as ineffective, harmful to the state’s economy, and erroneous.
“One thing that we learned along the way is lockdowns are wrong during the course of a pandemic,” Abbot declared, saying economic business activity in Texas had thrived because the state “remained open for business during the course of the pandemic.”
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The Republican Governor addressed his remarks to members of the Asian American Hotel Owners Association attending its national convention in Dallas, CBS DFW reported.
Though he encouraged safe “strategies” to slow community transmission of the virus, he stopped short of a widespread vaccine recommendation.
“…the safest thing that could be done is to make sure that everyone who wants one will get a vaccine,” the Texas governor said. “The surest way to end the pandemic is for everyone that wants one to make sure they get the vaccine.”
Abbott’s remarks followed the White House’s criticism Tuesday of his leadership during the pandemic.
“Some state officials are passing law or signing orders that forbid people from doing the right thing,” President Joe Biden said. “The most extreme of those measures is like the one in Texas that says state universities or community colleges could be fined if it allows a teacher to ask her unvaccinated students to wear a mask.”
Biden sharpened his attack, citing a surge in COVID case numbers amid the Delta variant’s rapid dominance and calling on Republican governors to help.
“Just two states, Florida and Texas, account for one-third of all new COVID 19 cases in the entire country,” Biden said, urging them to use their power to help or “at least get out of the way of people trying to do the right thing.”
Abbott touted state legislative efforts to help businesses who suffered losses during the pandemic, claiming the state now has the world’s ninth-largest economy and is more influential than Russia.
“That makes me more powerful than Putin,” Abbott said.
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