In a live Q&A segment, moderator Susan Page questions Vice President Mike Pence about a recent Rose Garden gathering that appeared to be a COVID-19 superspreader event, asking how the administration can expect public compliance when its own officials attended without social distancing. Pence defends the event as outdoor, cites trust in the American people, and contrasts the administration’s emphasis on personal freedom with what he characterizes as Democratic mandates and government overreach. Dennis Prager interjects repeatedly, challenging Pence’s answers, criticizing the administration’s handling of the pandemic, and drawing comparisons between COVID deaths and other mortality causes such as highway fatalities. Prager also questions the accuracy of international death‑per‑million rankings, mentions the pending calculation of excess deaths, and remarks on the informal use of Senator Kamala Harris’s first name as a sign of cultural deterioration. The exchange oscillates between factual claims, rhetorical framing, and personal commentary, highlighting partisan disagreements over pandemic response, statistical interpretation, and political discourse.
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—did everything right, Susan, we could still lose more than 200,000 Americans.
That's right, exactly. That was my point to you when I said there last hour, if there had been 100,000, she would go, 100,000 Americans, worst administration in history. I wish he'd have pointed out how many we lost in '68, '69 and didn't shut down the society when kids were dying, which they're not now. So I will get emails, what are you talking about? There was a kid in Detroit who died, or— So one or two or three invalidates the point? Considerably more kids are killed in car crashes than by COVID. Next, please.
Vice President Pence, you were in the front row in a Rose Garden event 11 days ago at what seems to have been a superspreader event for senior administration Congressional officials. No social distancing, few masks, and now a cluster of coronavirus cases among those who were there. How can you expect Americans to follow the administration's safety guidelines to protect themselves from COVID when you at the White House have not been doing so?
Okay, well, the American people have demonstrated over the last 8 months that when given the facts, they're willing to put the health of their families and their neighbors and people they don't even know first. President Trump and I have great confidence in the American people and their ability to take that information and put it into practice.
He's now going to deal with the Rose Garden, but I have to say, I don't understand his answer. Do you understand that answer? Okay, thank you. He did this repeatedly, and I think he was better than her, but he did it repeatedly. He would say pablum and then make a great point. And so then he'd be out of time as he's making his great point. Okay, go on. Now the answer to the Rose Garden question.
If I may say, that Rose Garden event, there's been a great deal of speculation about it. My wife Karen and I were there and honored to be there. Many of the people who were at that event, Susan, actually were tested for coronavirus, and it was an outdoor event, which all of our scientists regularly and routinely advise. The difference here is President Trump and I trust the American people to make choices in the best interest of their health. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris consistently talk about mandates and not just mandates with the coronavirus, but a government takeover of healthcare. Thank you. Thank you. Green New Deal, all government control. We're about freedom and respecting the freedom of the American people.
Why didn't he just say that without the beginning thing? We did. The American people are wonderful. And da ba da ba da ba da ba doo. Okay, I don't want to be told I'm wonderful by any politician. Okay, it is of no interest to me whether you think I and the rest of the people are wonderful. I hate pablum from my side or the other side. That is the point. We don't want to take over your life. We trust Americans to make good decisions. That's the answer. And it was outdoors. It was a super spreader. If it was a super spreader, how many people got hospitalized? President is overweight and 74, and he's fine. So then people say, well, he got special treatment. Okay, maybe so. He wants the space. He announced, I want this treatment given to everybody if that's what it takes. But, but at least he's a living example of, whoa, it doesn't appear to be that serious in a lot of people who were otherwise candidates for very serious sickness or death. That's right. Next, please. 80.
The American people have had to sacrifice far too much because of the incompetence of this administration. It is asking too much of the people.
Okay, right. Incompetence of this administration. What would they have done differently? And why were there— why were there, uh, more deaths per million in places like Belgium? They incompetent? They more incompetent in Belgium? Just to give one example, the United States is 8th. In, in per million deaths. That's on the assumption, by the way, that the numbers are accurate. Well, no, and I said I— truth is number one on this program. So we will know, and we won't know by the end of this year, we'll know by the end of next year how many excess deaths occurred this year. Then I would say that that's— that would be an accurate number of COVID Not excess deaths because of highway collisions, even though they are up, oddly enough. Much less traffic and there are more highway fatalities, apparently, because people are driving at crazy speeds. I mean, I do 80. I admit it. I do admit it. I don't do more than 80, but people are passing me constantly. I'm going with the flow of traffic at 80. That's the point I'm making. All right, uh, let's go, uh, oh yeah, this was interesting. Do 81.
I'm sorry, uh, Kamala Harris— Senator Harris, I mean. I'm sorry, that's fine. I'm Kamala. No, no, you're Senator Harris to me. I like that.
I, I, I, I like the, the moderator for saying that. That is correct. This, this, this was a new thing ushered in, I don't know, Bush administration, I don't know, calling, calling everybody by their first name. It's just, it's another deterioration. It's a subtle deterioration.
