Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said Tuesday that choosing whether to keep stay-at-home orders or reopen businesses is like deciding "between cancer and a heart attack," adding that "it's a miserable choice."
Kennedy told Fox Business: "We're faced with choosing between cancer and a heart attack. We've got to save lives; we've got to save livelihoods. It's a miserable choice."
He added, "But this much I do know: We cannot leave this economy shut down, or it's going to collapse. The Federal Reserve is holding it together with spit and duct tape and if the American economy collapses, the world economy collapses."
Kennedy, whose state has had over 24,000 coronavirus cases and 1,300 deaths related to the virus, predicted that the "preening elite" will accuse him of dismissing the cost to human life.
"Yeah, I care about human life — you can die from poverty, too," he said. "I care about saving lives and livelihoods, and I think that's the way most Americans feel."
The senator previously told Fox News' Tucker Carlson that the U.S. must reopen the economy despite the fact that it will cause the coronavirus "to spread faster."
"When we end the shutdown, the virus is going to spread faster," Kennedy said last week. "That's just a fact. And the American people understand that."
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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