House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), merely four months ago, admitted that the federal government cannot require an individual to be vaccinated — a stark contrast from the Biden administration’s recent moves, forcing private businesses to implement vaccine requirements for employees.
During an April 29 press conference, a reporter asked the 81-year-old California lawmaker why she would not consider “something like requiring that everyone be fully vaccinated.”
“There’s been some pushback from both the right and the left about requiring social distancing and fully masked participants last night,” the reporter asked.
“Why not consider something like requiring that everyone be fully vaccinated? Why require masks at a time when public health officials want the message to be about vaccination?” she continued.
“So – so here is the thing. We are – we cannot require someone to be vaccinated. That’s just not what we can do. It is a matter of privacy to know who is or who isn’t,” Pelosi said at the time.
“I can’t go to the Capitol Physician and say, ‘Give me the names of people who aren’t vaccinated, so I can go encourage them or make it known to others to encourage them to be vaccinated.’ So we can’t – we can’t do that,” she explained, expressing hope that “science would guide them to protect themselves, their family members and be good colleagues in the workplace to get vaccinated.”
She also admitted it is not possible to force shots on the American people.
“So, if we could, but we can’t require vaccinations for the Members, much less for the American people. Some people want to say, ‘Don’t come into my store unless you’re vaccinated, this or that.’ It causes commotion,” she admitted.