There have been a lot of stories from various outlets including @propublica @latimes & @washingtonpost about COVID contracts. I wrote about the absence of gov't oversight on them. nbcnews.com/politics/white…
@PhilMcCausland @cyrusfarivar & I continue to report on the response. 1/x
@PhilMcCausland @cyrusfarivar & I continue to report on the response. 1/x
Even with all the cash flowing out of federal coffers, nearly every decision made to spend money on equipment and services is a choice to forgo alternatives. That's particularly true in an environment in which so many big deals are being made without any competitive bidding 2/x
It's also particularly true because sources inside and outside the federal government say that some decisions have been made to satisfy political ends and there is evidence to back them up. 3/x
There's no question that the federal government began scrambling -- late -- to address a sprawling health and economic crisis. The need for speed is obvious. And it's also true that there can be legitimate disagreements about the best paths to pursue. 4/x
For example, Rick Bright was furious that he couldn't get anyone to pay attention to a company called Prestige Ameritech that said it could manufacture masks using U.S. facilities. The company got a contract only after it was introduced to Peter Navarro and the WH ordered it 5/x
If hiring the company to produce masks was the right thing to do, the process didn't work when Bright ran into opposition from political appointees and then it was circumvented by White House officials when the company made a public stink and got a connect from Steve Bannon. 6/x
Arguably oversight is more important rather than less important during a crisis that requires good decisions to be made. Oversight allows the ongoing response to improve and helps ensure future crises are handled more seamlessly. 7/x
But every level of oversight has been stripped away by the president. Congress can't get information. Inspectors general overseeing contracting have been removed from their jobs. 8/x
We reported last week on a contract Battelle received to sell, service and operate machines that the company says can recycle N95 masks so they can be used 20 times. nbcnews.com/politics/white…
Trump forced the FDA to waive rules to tee up a contract that is worth up to $600M. 9/x
Trump forced the FDA to waive rules to tee up a contract that is worth up to $600M. 9/x
It started out as a $60M deal to sell machines. The CEO of the company said that part is now $78M. Some health care workers say they fear for their safety because they believe masks degrade after two or three cycles. If it works, it's a way to reduce need for scarce N95s. 10/x
The only oversight of the deal is Battelle reporting data on its work to an FDA that already bent to Trump's will when he instructed the agency to revise its ruling. The revision required Battelle to do the servicing and operation. That added hundreds of millions of dollars. 11/x
There's opportunity cost in that decision. For starters, $600 million is the equivalent of 472 million new N95 masks at retail price. But N95s are scarce and mostly coming from China. The trade war and domestic politics appear to have complicated getting Chinese PPE. 12/x
The federal gov't dismissed smaller producers of PPE when it ramped up acquisition in March and April. It has also been slow to jump on alternative mask-cleaning technologies. The decision was made to tap the biggest companies for acquisition and distribution. 13/x
In Project Airbridge, a program devised by the White House's supply chain task force and directed in part by Jared Kushner, Uncle Sam paid for chartered jets to fly private companies' equipment into the U.S. and took a cut of the authority to distribute it. 14/x
Some distribution decisions were clearly based on politics. And handing over the authority to direct goods meant that companies had to pull up short on what customers were expecting to get -- customers being hospital systems, states and cities among others. 15/x
Inside the administration experts have warned about the risks of re-opening hastily and the spread of the virus in smaller communities only to be muted by political appointees acting in concert with Trump's push to re-open. We've reported on documents showing that friction. 16/x
Again, Trump has neutered oversight within the administration — he's put fear of repercussion into civil servants by removing critics and even inspectors general who are not seen as pure loyalists — and on Capitol Hill. 17/x
At the very least the absence of oversight creates suspicion around decision-making. A president should want independent validation of his decisions if they're good decisions and made for the right reasons. 18/x
What's left in terms of oversight is the media. That helps explain why the president has focused so much energy on trying to discredit the media. 19/x
