Andrea Mitchell Reports guest host Peter Alexander was forced to acknowledge on Friday that maybe Trump Administration officials were correct, or at the very least, not conspiracy theorists, in declaring COVID-19 to be the result of a lab leak. Still, Alexander wondered if the former administration was looking for a scapegoat, a notion former Pence staffer-turned MSM hero Olivia Troye was to eager to affirm.
Alexander asked Troye to comment on the fact that, "President Trump declared a year ago he had seen strong evidence -- he had a high degree of confidence there was a lab leak. He’s now claiming vindication. What was going on behind the scenes then? Was President Trump and your old boss, the vice president, were they more focused on finding a scapegoat than formulating a response?"
Troye was not about to admit she was wrong, "Yes, I think the problem was they were focused on trying to shift the blame to someone else and so China becomes the narrative."
According to Troye, "the vice president, the vice president’s chief of staff would ask repeatedly did it come from the lab? Is it a bioweapon? And each time I would refute this, but it kept coming up and then I realized when I got a Washington Times article talking about the lab leak and some Breitbart pieces that this is where this information was coming from."
Of course, it's now coming from liberal journalists as well, but acknowledging that would mean the end of Troye's 15 minutes of fame. Still, Troye claimed:
The intelligence community made its assessment and said, took we really cannot -- we don't have concrete evidence one way or another. That's what they were briefed on. I became concerned that disinformation was being pushed inside the White House from other sources, like Peter Navarro and others, and I certainly did not want Vice President Pence to repeat that to the public.
Eventually, Alexander interrupted to ask, "So, was President Trump basing that on anything other than an article or information that he had read or heard?"
Troye replied, "No, I don't believe he was. The fact of the matter is, if it was there, knowing what we know about the Trump Administration and how they operated, they would have declassified it."
She then noted the IC's assessment has not changed, which is true, but she declined to mention that expert opinion is shifting away from the natural occurrence thesis. It's also disingenuous because absent a fundamental change from the CCP, nobody will never know for certain.
Troye then appeared to admit she wasn't concerned with the truth, but rather that the lab leak thesis "would lead to a rise in hate crimes against Asian-Americans. That's fundamentally why whenever this conspiracy thing or these questions would come up, I would try to swat them down immediately."
This is who the media has chosen to portray as an alarm-ringing truth-teller, fighting the lies and incompetence of the Trump Administration's COVID response.
This segment was sponsored by HughesNet. Their contact information is linked at the Conservatives Fight Back page.
Here is a transcript of the May 28 show:
MSNBC
Andrea Mitchell Reports
12:51 PM ET
PETER ALEXANDER: Olivia, let me ask you about your time serving in the Trump Administration where you worked for Mike Pence. The president, President Trump declared a year ago he had seen strong evidence -- he had a high degree of confidence there was a lab leak. He’s now claiming vindication. What was going on behind the scenes then? Was President Trump and your old boss, the vice president, were they more focused on finding a scapegoat than formulating a response?
OLIVIA TROYE: Yes, I think the problem was they were focused on trying to shift the blame to someone else and so China becomes the narrative. In a fundamentally, I had been really concerned because they kept asking me, the vice president, the vice president’s chief of staff would ask repeatedly did it come from the lab? Is it a bioweapon? And each time I would refute this, but it kept coming up and then I realized when I got a Washington Times article talking about the lab leak and some Breitbart pieces that this is where this information was coming from. It was not coming from anything that we were briefing on behalf of the intelligence community. The intelligence community made its assessment and said, took we really cannot -- we don't have concrete evidence one way or another. That's what they were briefed on. I became concerned that disinformation was being pushed inside the White House from other sources, like Peter Navarro and others, and I certainly did not want Vice President Pence to repeat that to the public. That would be dangerous. I was also concerned, go ahead…
ALEXANDER: I didn't mean to interrupt you, I was just going to say, for clarity, when President Trump said a year ago he had a high degree of confidence, even if he couldn't detail where he had seen it, clearly even now the intelligence community acknowledged it doesn't know whether this was a leak or an infected animal to human contact. So, was President Trump basing that on anything other than an article or information that he had read or heard?
TROYE: No, I don't believe he was. The fact of the matter is, if it was there, knowing what we know about the Trump Administration and how they operated, they would have declassified it. They would have had it front and center if it was there and Pompeo talking about it as well, claiming there was full-on evidence. Well, where was it? Because as a member of the IC, and knowing what we know and the public reporting, they have come to the same conclusion once again and look, what I was going to say is that my greater concern was that I was concerned that they would start to push the pejorative terms like they did, which I was concerned, as a Homeland person, that it would lead to a rise in hate crimes against Asian-Americans. That's fundamentally why whenever this conspiracy thing or these questions would come up, I would try to swat them down immediately and I really I just kind of fought to make sure as much as I could control from my purview that Pence would not go along with this and push these kinds of things when saw the president at the time, Trump, come forward and say these terms, because I knew what it would lead to.
