SPIN THIS MAGATs: Trump Let Contract With Ventilator Firm Lapse

[kpete]

WASHINGTON — President Trump has repeatedly assured Americans that the federal government is holding 10,000 ventilators in reserve to ship to the hardest-hit hospitals around the nation as they struggle to keep the most critically ill patients alive.

But what federal officials have neglected to mention is that an additional 2,109 lifesaving devices are unavailable after the contract to maintain the government’s stockpile lapsed late last summer, and a contracting dispute meant that a new firm did not begin its work until late January. By then, the coronavirus crisis was already underway.

The revelation came in response to inquiries to the Department of Health and Human Services after state officials reported that some of the ventilators they received were not operational, stoking speculation that the administration had not kept up with the task of maintaining the stockpile.

In fact, the contract with a company that was maintaining the machines expired at the end of last summer, and a contract protest delayed handing the job to Agiliti, a Minneapolis-based provider of medical equipment services and maintenance. Agiliti was not given the $38 million task until late January, when the scope of the global coronavirus crisis was first becoming clear.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/01/us/politics/coronavirus-ventilators.html

[tanyev]

1. The Shart of the Deal.

[underpants]

2. Oh that's a burn

[Hugin]

8. Oh, yeah! I'm definitely making myself one of those!

Maybe even a full scale display in the front yard.

Hmm... I've got an un-used BBQ gas line there... and... The eternal flame... Hmm.

Thanks.

[Gothmog]

3. Was Jared in charge of this?

[Canoe52]

4. Almost? Not the way I would have put that.

pos

[Harker]

9. Yeah.

You can strike "almost" for me, too.

[crickets]

10. Oh, it's not almost. Not at all.

I am glad to see the word out and about. I wish more people would use it, because as the days go by it becomes more and more obvious that 'criminal negligence' is just not going to be enough to describe the situation.

[JHB]

5. What company had the contract before, and...

...who is the new company, Agiliti, connected to?

[Hugin]

6. What do you expect from a guy who's such a cheapskate he wouldn't install fire suppression...

equipment in his $700 Million building to protect his investment.

[TNNurse]

7. I do not think "almost" belongs in that sentence.

[gibraltar72]

11. A dollar saved is a dollar he can steal.

[MissMillie]

12. Gee, what was happening late last summer?

Hmmmmm….

Isn't that right around the time when 45 was actively withholding money from Ukraine and trying to keep his actions secret?