GM was wasting time': Trump invokes DPA to force GM to make ventilators

[Somedude]

GM was wasting time': Trump invokes DPA to force GM to make ventilators

The move to activate the Defense Production Act came the same day that Trump slammed GM on Twitter.

 

The GM plant is shown in Lordstown, Ohio. | Jeff Swensen/Getty Images

By GAVIN BADE

03/27/2020 12:28 PM EDT

Updated: 03/27/2020 06:57 PM EDT

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President Donald Trump today invoked the Defense Production Act, directing General Motors to produce ventilators needed for the coronavirus outbreak, hours after lashing out at the automaker on Twitter,and following weeks of increasingly loud pleas from governors and mayors to put the powerful statute into use.

Trump also appointed trade advisor Peter Navarro to coordinate the government’s efforts to purchase and distribute emergency medical supplies, including ventilators and protective equipment for health care workers.

 

“We will not hesitate to use the full authority of the federal government to combat this crisis,” Trump said at a White House briefing. “We thought we had a deal with, as an example General Motors, and I guess they thought otherwise. They didn’t agree, and now they do.”

 

 

The move to activate the Korean War-era emergency law came the same day that Trump slammed GM on Twitter after reports emerged that his administration had called off a deal to buy tens of thousands of ventilators that GM agreed to produce in partnership with a ventilator manufacturer. It marks a pivotal turn in Trump's previous reluctance to put the DPA into use.

 

 

Trump rails against Governors Whitmer and Inslee over lack of appreciation

 

 

 

“As usual with ‘this’ General Motors, things just never seem to work out,” Trump tweeted. “They said they were going to give us 40,000 much needed Ventilators, ‘very quickly’. Now they are saying it will only be 6000, in late April, and they want top dollar. Always a mess with Mary B. Invoke ‘P’.”

The tweet came the morning after The New York Times reported that a deal between GM and medical device supplier Ventec to provide up to 80,000 ventilators was called off after FEMA said it needed more time to assess how much the ventilators would cost.

 

 

 

Minutes after the first tweet, Trump called on GM to reopen its recently shuttered auto plant in Lordstown, Ohio, to begin producing ventilators.

“General Motors MUST immediately open their stupidly abandoned Lordstown plant in Ohio, or some other plant, and START MAKING VENTILATORS, NOW!!!!!!,” he tweeted. “FORD, GET GOING ON VENTILATORS, FAST!!!!!! @GeneralMotors @Ford”

In a statement, GM said it, Ventec and its suppliers have been "working around the clock for over a week to meet this urgent need. Our commitment to build Ventec’s high-quality critical care ventilator, VOCSN, has never wavered."

Trump’s move comes amid rising criticism from Congressional Democrats and governors from states hard-hit by the virus outbreak, who have blamed Trump for not invoking the DPA sooner. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, whose state has more than 3,000 coronavirus cases, praised Trump's decision but said that more federal support will be needed.

 

 

Trump discusses DPA, ventilator production and deal with GM

 

 

 

"That’s terrific, but we need more," Pritzker said. "We need thousands more ventilators, as many as we can in short order. As you hear time and time again, you’re competing against everybody all the time.”

Trump’s decision to invoke the DPA caps more than a week of false starts with the emergency law, which allows the president to direct private industry to produce needed goods in a crisis. Trump first activated the DPA with an executive order March 18, but said he would use it only if necessary.

As recently as Thursday night, Trump was downplaying the need for more ventilators in an appearance on Fox News. “I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they’re going to be,” he told Sean Hannity. “I don't believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators. You go into major hospitals sometimes, and they’ll have two ventilators. And now all of a sudden they’re saying, ‘Can we order 30,000 ventilators?’”

At a press conference Friday evening, Trump repeated his claim that GM lowered its ventilator offer in negotiations with the White House and implied that he invoked the DPA in response.

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“We thought we had a deal for 40,000 ventilators, and all of a sudden, it became six [thousand] and price became a big object,” Trump said. “But Peter Navarro is going to handle that … Maybe they'll change their tune. But we didn't want to play games with them.”

The president also said his previous opposition to GM’s decision to shutter an auto plant in Lordstown, Ohio, made negotiations with the automaker difficult.

“I was extremely unhappy with Lordstown, Ohio, when they left Lordstown, Ohio, in the middle of an auto boom,” Trump said, adding later “and frankly, I think that would be a good place to build the ventilators.”

Appearing on CNN Friday, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said she knows GM will "rise to the challenge," but that it "won't happen overnight. Switching over from building cars to building something as complicated as a ventilator is going to take a while, and we don't have a lot of time to waste."

"That's why I'm glad to see this action. I would love to see more of this, more of the strategic powers of the president to be used nationally. We need a national strategy. This patchwork of laws based on who the governors are really isn't the best strategy going forward," she said.

[Somedude]

Trump invokes federal law to compel General Motors to make ventilators

Claire Bushey in Chicago, Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson in New York and Kiran Stacey in Washington

6-7 minutes

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President Donald Trump triggered the federal government’s wartime powers to compel General Motors to make ventilators needed to treat coronavirus patients, lashing out at the automaker for failing to act more quickly to produce the critical medical equipment.

Mr Trump said he moved to invoke the 1950s-era Defense Production Act, which gives the president power to force manufacturers to make needed equipment in national emergencies, after negotiations between Washington and GM broke down over the cost of the ventilator order.

But the president also acknowledged his decision was motivated by longstanding anger at the company for shutting domestic manufacturing plants. “I wasn’t happy when GM built plants over the years, the build a lot of plants in other countries,” Mr Trump said. 

“Price became a big object,” he added. “We didn’t want to play games with them . . . We’re not looking to get ripped off on price.”

James Cain, GM’s spokesperson, denied the company had been dragging its feet on producing ventilators, which have become the most needed piece of medical equipment in the pandemic since most victims die due to lung failure.

Mr Cain said GM had worked with the ventilator manufacturer Ventec “around the clock for over a week to meet this urgent need. Our commitment to build Ventec’s high-quality critical care ventilator . . . has never wavered.”

The move marked a reversal for Mr Trump, who had said previously that he did not need to use his DPA powers because companies were doing all they could to help produce such equipment. Democratic critics of the president had argued he should use his authority under the act.

“It is time for the president to stop whining and tweeting and start acting,” Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy told reporters on Friday, hours before the White House announcement. “The president complained today about GM’s apparent reversal on the number of ventilators they were going to produce. Well, it doesn’t have to be up to GM. The president of the United States has the power [to compel companies].”

Mr Trump had earlier criticised GM and Ford on Twitter for not manufacturing ventilators fast enough, calling on GM to bolster supplies by reopening a plant it sold last year.

“Our negotiations with GM regarding its ability to supply ventilators have been productive, but our fight against the virus is too urgent to allow the give-and-take of the contracting process to continue to run its normal course,” the White House said in a statement. “GM was wasting time.” 

GM said earlier that it would join with Ventec to produce the medical equipment, including at its factory in Kokomo, Indiana. GM and Ventec would deliver the first ventilators next month with capacity to increase to 10,000 a month. GM will donate resources at cost.

The manufacturers are not the ones who should be making life and death decisions about who receives what, when

GM, Ford and Fiat Chrysler have all rolled out plans to help make medical equipment or protective gear to combat the coronavirus pandemic.

The GM-Ventec venture had been scheduled to debut on Wednesday, but was delayed while government officials weighed whether the $1bn price tag was prohibitive, The New York Times reported.

Mr Trump said on Twitter that GM was delivering fewer ventilators than promised while asking for “top dollar”.

The president said GM and Ford should “GET GOING ON VENTILATORS, FAST!!!!!!”. He also said GM should reopen the plant at Lordstown, Ohio, that it sold to a start-up planning to make electric trucks.

Industry groups led by the US Chamber of Commerce have argued against formal government intervention under the DPA, saying that manufacturers are rising to the challenge voluntarily.

The act gives the president the authority to demand that manufacturers give priority to government orders, to prevent hoarding and price gouging, and to provide incentives in the form of purchase guarantees and subsidies, noted Katrina Mulligan, a national security expert with the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

“The manufacturers are not the ones who should be making life and death decisions about who receives what, when,” she argued.

Yet the DPA does not grant limitless powers. A company must have an existing contract with the government for Washington to insist it receive priority treatment, said Michael Barnicle, chair of the government contracting practice at Duane Morris.

Ventec has bid on government contracts to supply ventilators, but it is unclear if they have been awarded a contract. GM announced a week ago that it would use its purchasing and logistics expertise to help Ventec, a smaller manufacturer headquartered in suburban Seattle, to increase production.

Ford is working with Minnesota manufacturer 3M and GE Healthcare on efforts to build a modified respirator and a modified ventilator, the latter of which would need fast-tracked approval from the federal government for production. Ford and the United Auto Workers union also plan to make about 100,000 face shields a month for hospital workers.

Although GM has closed all its plants in North America, 1,000 UAW members will return to work to make the ventilators. The company also plans to make surgical masks at a Warren, Michigan, plant, reaching 50,000 a day in two weeks.

“We are proud to stand with other American companies and our skilled employees to meet the needs of this global pandemic,” said Mary Barra, chief executive.

GM shares closed 5.3 per cent lower on Friday, while Ford’s were down about 1 per cent.

[Anta Assamey]

Veedu ippude nidra legichadu .... He should have done it once he announced lock down ... 

[bhaigan]

Thatha ee pani eppudo chesi undalsindi