ANALYSIS: Looking at Biden's pragmatic approach to coronavirus rules

Inside Biden's pragmatic approach to coronavirus rules President Biden has taken a decidedly cautious approach to COVID-19 passports and other rules governing the coronavirus, signaling a determination to not get in front of public opinion. Morgan Chalfant and Brett Samuels TheHill

President Biden has taken a decidedly cautious approach to COVID-19 passports and other rules governing the coronavirus, signaling a determination to not get in front of public opinion.

Biden has avoided stepping into a messy fight over both passports and coronavirus vaccine mandates, choosing instead to let private sector companies, schools and other institutions make the call on whether to require vaccinations. 

The move has spurred frustration from some health experts who argue that the administration is missing a critical opportunity to get the virus under control by encouraging vaccine requirements.

But wading into the controversial territory would trigger an avalanche of criticism from Republicans who have already hammered the notion of employer vaccine mandates, and could prompt further skepticism among Americans already reluctant to get the shot.

A June Axios-Ipsos poll found that Americans are split on requiring vaccines to return to pre-pandemic activities like dining indoors and going to work. 

As a result, there’s some political risk on either side of the issue, though it’s clear the White House for now sees more risk in embracing mandates and passports.

“There’s no question that vaccines are critically important, everyone in America who is able to should get a vaccine and that is the only way we are going to achieve herd immunity,” said Harold Pollack, co-director of the University of Chicago Health Lab.

“I think there’s a flipside which is, if you get way ahead of public acceptance, that you may on net undermine your public health objectives,” he added.

The White House has been consistent that it does not see its role as issuing vaccine mandates. Instead, officials insist the government should be focused on ramping up supply of the vaccine, educating the public and providing resources at the local level to get shots into arms to put an end to the pandemic.

One former Biden adviser noted the president has repeatedly deferred to health officials on the coronavirus.

Biden also criticized former President Donald Trump for politicizing COVID-19.

Still, calls from experts outside the administration, most recently ex-Obama administration official Kathleen Sebelius, are growing louder for the White House to do more as the U.S. struggles to convince roughly one-third of the population to get the shot as more transmissible variants circulate more widely. ...