Boosters

Trump sends New York Times reporter handwritten note saying he's 'very proud' of COVID vaccines

After former President Donald Trump disclosed to a booing crowd Sunday that he had received a COVID-19 booster shot, New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman "asked a Trump spokeswoman why he switched his message on the vaccine/booster" — Trump suggested in September that he would not get boosted — and Trump himself wrote back, saying he is "very proud to have produced the three vaccines so quickly," Haberman tweeted Monday evening. On request, she posted an image of the handwritten note.

The Trump administration facilitated the rapid rollout of the Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson vaccines through a financial infusion and purchase guarantee program called Operation Warp Speed, though the mRNA technology used in the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines had been decades in development. Trump did not announce that he had quietly gotten vaccinated in his last days in office until at least weeks after he left the White House.

Trump supporters are among the largest group of unvaccinated Americans, and on the occasions Trump encourages them to get inoculated, his fans aren't generally receptive to the idea. Watch one Trump voter tell The Daily Show's Jordan Klepper she won't get vaccinated in part because she feels the vaccines were developed too quickly — or, as Klepper prompts her, at "warp speed."