On her MSNBC show Wednesday, Andrea Mitchell welcomed Senator and former vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine to discuss the State Department ordering the Chinese consulate in Houston to be closed by Friday. Mitchell made this all about Trump, asking Kaine if this move decision was just political grandstanding to distract from his failures in handling the coronavirus pandemic.
The decision to order the Houston consulate to close came after an increase in spying and state-backed hacking indictments and according to Sen. Marco Rubio, was a hub for Chinese espionage against the United States.
ANDREA MITCHELL: And you've got the Deputy Secretary of State, Steve Biegun, who has been ambassador and has handled China and North Korea and South Korea relations. At this stage, do you suspect there is a political motive? We're sorry to say, but in this context, the president keeps talking about ‘the China Virus, ’ albeit China did mishandle their original reporting on the COVID-19.
TIM KAINE: They certainly did. They certainly did.
MITCHELL: But do you think this is partly to find a scapegoat?
Kaine gave the standard Democrat response: "If China made mistakes, they need to be called out for them. But the president is trying to deflect attention from his mistakes in the United States that have led us to have the highest death toll in the world." Mitchell then took that soundbite and dropped it into her China story on Wednesday's NBC Nightly News.
But, Mitchell, the journalist, should've just reported the facts of why the consulate was ordered close, because China has been causing trouble for quite some time and that has nothing do with Trump.
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Here is a transcript of the July 23 show:
MSNBC
Andrea Mitchell Reports
12:47 PM ET
ANDREA MITCHELL: And you've got the Deputy Secretary of State, Steve Biegun, who has been ambassador and has handled China and North Korea and South Korea relations. At this stage, do you suspect there is a political motive? We're sorry to say, but in this context, the president keeps talking about ‘the China Virus, ’ albeit China did mishandle their original reporting on the COVID-19.
TIM KAINE: They certainly did. They certainly did.
MITCHELL: But do you think this is partly to find a scapegoat?KAINE: Yes. The president is, I believe, trying to deflect attention. China made some huge mistakes up front. But why were nations like South Korea and Vietnam that are right near China able to so much better deal with the virus than the United States? If China made mistakes, they need to be called out for them. But the president is trying to deflect attention from his mistakes in the United States that have led us to have the highest death toll in the world. And as we see right now, both the death toll, the daily case level and the economic carnage resulting from that are really hammering our country. And so the president -- and look, you have earlier reported this, that there is a GOP memo going around a few weeks ago saying to Senate Republicans, they need to try to make this election about blaming the Democrats for being too pro-china. Well, President Trump himself has a long track record of praising China, praising the leadership of China, et cetera. I do view this as, you know, probably motivated by electoral politics. Of course we do have major, major challenges with China. And we're deeply concerned about their human rights record and about theft of intellectual property, about a whole series of issues. So the instinct to do something is not a bad instinct. But from the very beginning of the administration, the president has decided to try to go it alone rather than gathering our allies together who have the same issues with China to try to confront them.
