Trump administration officials are gearing up to work alongside jurisdictions and local governments to make sure that schools can safely reopen in the fall after remaining closed for months due to the coronavirus pandemic. The administration insists the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) never advised to close schools in the first place.
Trump and first lady Melania Trump will be hosting a meeting at the White House on July 14, where they'd be talking about reopening schools safely across the nation. Earlier this week, a senior administration told reporters that it is important to reopen America's schools, with Trump accusing Joe Biden and the Democrats of insisting to keep schools close for political reasons, rather than health reasons in a tweet.
The official noted that the CDC did not recommend closing schools as part of its guidance, adding that the decision was made by the local jurisdictional. Moreover, the official said there are several strategies for schools to adopt and ensure the reopening process is safe for the children, teachers, and other staffers.
According to the official, the CDC never cited school closures as an effective strategy, and these are local decisions. The administration will work with local jurisdictions to figure out the best ways to reopen schools safely in fall and provide students an active educational component so that they can get back to where they would have preferred to have been in spring.
Providing an active educational component is a vital part of the communities and important for the health and well-being of individuals that are school age, the official said. According to the official, the concern was not specifically related to the young students, but rather if they contract the virus and then transmit it to other family members.
These comments come after Trump urged schools to reopen this fall in a series of tweets that also accused Democrats of wanting to keep them closed for political reasons. In his first tweet, the president insisted that the schools must reopen in the fall, and in another tweet said Biden and the Democrats want schools to remain close because they think it will help them in the impending election.
As coronavirus cases continue to spike in multiple parts of the country, several states have neither decided about reopening schools in the fall nor have they decide the capacity they might do so. The American Academy of Pediatrics has warned against allowing children to attend schools in fall, Fox News reported.