White House senior adviser Jared Kushner made a rare appearance in the White House press briefing room Thursday amid reports about his exp...
White House senior adviser Jared Kushner made a rare appearance in the White House press briefing room Thursday amid reports about his expanded role in handling the coronavirus crisis and criticism of his efforts.
Kushner has put together a group of private-sector friends, including his former roommate, to aid the administration's response to the coronavirus.
He said President Donald Trump 'wanted us to make sure that we think outside the box, make sure we are finding all the best thinkers in the country, getting all the best ideas and that we are doing everything possible to make sure we can keep Americans safe.'
White House senior adviser Jared Kushner made a rare appearance in the briefing room amid reports about his expanded role in handling the coronavirus
Jared Kushner's 'shadow' coronavirus task force has come under criticism for causing confusion in the government about who plays what role
Kushner specifically talked about getting surgical masks to New York, saying he was made aware of the problem by the president, who got a call from a friend of his in the state to complain about the lack of protective gear.
'Got a call from the president, he told me he was hearing from friends of his in New York that the New York public hospital system was running low on critical supplies,' Kushner said.
He described making a series of calls to officials and said the result was the administration would 'send a month of supply.'
'We'll be doing similar things with all the different public hospitals that are in the hot spot zones,' he said.
He then proceeded to lecture governors - many of whom have been begging the federal government for medical equipment as they struggle to respond to the pandemic amid dwindling supplies - on how to be 'good managers.'
'You have to take inventory in your state, and you have to be able to prove that there’s a real need,' he said of the requests for they were getting for ventilators, marks and other protective gear for workers on the front line, who are at high risk of contracting the contagious disease.
He said that governors should know 'the number of how many ventilators they have in their state because that's the first thing a good manager will do.'
'What a lot of the voters are seeing now is that when you would like somebody to be a mayor or governor or president, you're trying to think about who will be a competent manager during the time of crisis. This is a time of crisis, and you're seeing certain people are better managers than others,' he added.
Jared Kushner advised governors begging for masks and other supplies to be 'good managers' during the pandemic
Jared Kushner also defended his team's work and down played reports of tension with Vice President Mike Pence's coronavirus task force
Kushner's appearance before the press comes as his new team has caused tension and confusion among officials who are unclear about the exact role Kushner's 'shadow' response team plays and how it fits in with the official task force led by Vice President Mike Pence.
Kushner, the son-in-law to President Donald Trump, has not been a public face to the response but Thursday he appeared to be coming out of the shadows to talk about his work.
He defended his work, pushing back at reports of tension with Pence's team, saying he and the vice president talk multiple times a day.
'I've been serving really at the direction of the vice president. He's asked me to get involved in different projects, the Vice President I speak to, probably, sometimes 5 to 10 times a day. But everything that I'm doing is at the direction of vice president,' Kushner said.
President Trump also stepped in to describe the multiple reports of confusion and tension caused by the different teams at work as fake news.
Kushner's 'shadow' team includes a slew of McKinsey consultants plus his former roommate and current U.S. foreign investment czar Adam Boehler, and Brad Smith, the head of Medicare's innovation center.
White House senior adviser Jared Kushner has put together a group of private-sector friends to respond to the coronavirus
Kushner's group includes his former roommate, U.S. foreign investment czar Adam Boehler
Jared Kushner had his own brush with the coronavirus when his wife Ivanka Trump had to be tested after she met with an Australian official who later tested positive for the disease
Despite the confusion, officials have described a line of distinction in operations. Kushner's group leads the 'all-of-private' sector response while Pence leads the 'all-of-government' effort is how sources described it to Politico.
At that point, the Trump administration was struggling to play catchup in its response to the pandemic, including making sure there were enough tests available to detect the disease.
A senior administration official described to DailyMail.com an all-hands on deck effort by Kushner's office that consisted of round-the-clock work by his team, including Hope Hicks, the former communications director who returned to the administration.
Kushner has been spotted leaving his Washington D.C. home early - around 7:30 a.m. most mornings - to head to his office in the West Wing, which is just down the hall from the Oval Office.
His presence has been seen and felt. He's in White House meetings with private sector officials on responding to the virus, he joined President Trump's call with governors at FEMA and was with the president on Capitol Hill when Trump went there to rally Republicans around an aid package.
Kushner had his own brush with the coronavirus when his wife Ivanka Trump had to be tested after she met with an Australian official who later tested positive for the disease. Ivanka Trump's test result was negative.
But Kushner's involvement in the response effort has also led to criticism.
The Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington - a government watchdog group - charged Kushner's 'shadow coronavirus task force' with violating the Presidential Records Act by using private email instead of their government accounts, which makes an automatic record of the correspondence.
That 'leaves the public in the dark about the work the shadow task force has done and the influence of private industries on the administration's response to the coronavirus pandemic,' the group charged.
His group also has also duplicated existing efforts and teams, Politico reported after talking to multiple officials involved in the response effort, and its focus on rapid, short-term decisions has created concern among some health-agency officials.
One official told The Washington Post earlier this month they're getting emails from private industry employees on Kushner's team but have no idea what role these people play.
'We don't know who these people are,' a senior official said. 'Who is this? We're all getting these emails.'
There is concern about a lack of coordination - causing confusion about who is doing what - and there has been limited vetting of the private sector officials involved, raising questions about possible conflicts of interest.
Jared Kushner has been spotted leaving his Washington D.C. home early - around 7:30 a.m. most mornings - to head to his office in the West Wing
Jared Kushner attends a teleconference with governors at the Federal Emergency Management Agency on March 19
An official told Politico that the proper ethical precautions are being taken.
'There have been two rules: People signed voluntary service agreements that were vetted by career legal professionals — and that there is no one doing procurement, outside of government officials,' the senior administration official said.
There's also the usual bickering about who's territory is whose since Kushner's group has gotten involved in all areas of the government's response, including at Health and Human Services and at FEMA.
And he's had his missteps. Kushner helped write the Oval Office address the president gave earlier this month - a speech that was widely panned and saw the stock market tank the next morning.
The criticism has been muted, however, Kushner is seen by many officials as 'untouchable' within the administration given his closeness to the president, to whom he speaks many times a day.
Both Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump have frustrated chiefs of staff who have tried to impose order on the unruly White House when they go outside the command structure by simply walking into the Oval Office to speak to the president.
A senior administration official told DailyMail.com that Kushner's and Pence's teams are working together and described Kushner's group as working to support government agencies in their work.
White House adviser Jared Kushner listens as President Donald Trump talks to reporters on Capitol Hill on March 10
Jared Kushner attends a meeting with President Donald Trump and several CEOs of major banks to discuss the coronavirus response in the Cabinet Room at the White House on March 11
Jared Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump, seen with President Trump and first lady Melania Trump at a December Hanukkah reception, are seen as untouchable within the White House
Kushner also has his defenders, who say the presidential son-in-law has plugged gaps in helping move supplies and helped arranged flights to bring medical supplies in from overseas instead of the usual method of using ships.
And Kushner himself defended his work to The Washington Post earlier this month.
'We're getting things done in record speeds and are doing everything possible to avoid damage and mitigate the negative impacts,' he told the newspaper. 'In America, some of our best resources are in our private sector. The federal government is not designed to solve all our problems; a lot of the muscle is in the private sector and there's also a lot of smart people.'
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