Sen. Marco Rubio Wednesday demanded the resignation of World Health Organization Director Tedros Adhanom, claiming that under him, WHO has been "politicized" under him and that it defended how China handled the coronavirus outbreak.
“China has undertaken an effort over the last 15 years to sort of infiltrate and exert influence over international organizations at the United Nations and, of course, the World Health Organization," the Florida Republican told Fox News' "Fox and Friends."
His comments come after President Donald Trump said Tuesday during the daily White House coronavirus task force briefing that he's considering a "hold" on U.S. funding for the WHO after the agency "blew it" by failing to sound the alarm sooner about the coronavirus.
Trump also complained that the Geneva-based international organization is "very China-centric" and said the WHO was wrong to advise against the travel restrictions that he'd imposed against China in January.
Rubio insisted Wednesday that the WHO has been politicized at its highest levels.
“What you saw early on in this pandemic is they went to China and came out saying that ‘China is doing a great job — everything they’re saying is true’ and then condemning, not just the U.S., but also condemning any country that considered bans on travel from and to China,” Rubio said.
Further, the senator said, the WHO should be making announcements under the "basis of medical science," not duress from any country.
"I hope that, at a minimum, we can get the leader of that organization to resign because he has definitely been politicized," said Rubio.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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