Biden will travel to Michigan over July 4th weekend to celebrate progress in Covid-19 fight

By CNN Newsource

Published June 28, 2021 1:43 PM

By Kate Sullivan, CNN

President Joe Biden will travel to Traverse City, Michigan, on Saturday as the White House looks to use the July Fourth holiday weekend to mark progress in the fight against Covid-19 after more than a year of the pandemic, according to a White House official.

The White House’s theme for the holiday weekend is “America’s Back Together,” according to the official, and the administration is looking to promote the idea that the country is returning to a pre-pandemic normal. First lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, second gentleman Doug Emhoff and members of Biden’s Cabinet will also travel across the country over the holiday weekend.

“The work to vaccinate America and bring us to this moment has been monumental, and the President, vice president, first lady and second gentleman, along with members of the Cabinet, will be fanning out across the country to celebrate our progress in fighting this pandemic and getting our country back to normal,” the White House official said.

Jill Biden will travel to Maine and New Hampshire, and Harris will travel to Nevada on Saturday. Emhoff will travel to Utah on Friday.

Between Thursday and Sunday, Biden’s Cabinet will deploy across the country to attend roundtables and baseball games plus visit fire stations, festivals, parades, cookouts and more, according to the official. States that members of the Cabinet will visit include Colorado, Virginia, Oklahoma, New Mexico, California, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New York, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Ohio, Iowa and New Hampshire, along with Puerto Rico and Washington, DC.

The travel comes ahead of a massive celebration the Bidens are hosting at the White House on July Fourth for more than a thousand essential workers and military families on the South Lawn. The celebration will be the largest in-person White House event since Biden took office.

“We look forward to celebrating with essential workers and military families on the South Lawn of the White House, as well as Americans at events across the country, that America’s back together thanks to the Biden administration’s whole-of-government pandemic response, the countless essential workers and first responders, and the resiliency of the American people,” the White House official told CNN.

The White House last week acknowledged the US would fall short of Biden’s July Fourth Covid-19 vaccination goals, saying the country has more work to do to get younger Americans vaccinated. White House Covid-19 response coordinator Jeff Zients told reporters the administration was on track to hit those goals weeks after the initial target date.

The President had aimed to get 70% of US adults to have at least one Covid-19 vaccine shot by July Fourth. As of Monday, 66.1% of American adults have had at least one vaccine shot.

This story is breaking and will be updated.