Washington pushes back on Cruise Line Industry’s efforts to restart in July 2021

The White House backed up the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as that agency spars with cruise operators that want its approval to restart voyages in July, 2021.

Norwegian Cruise Line aims to resume operations from U.S. ports starting July 4, while Carnival this week extended its U.S. pause through June 30 and said it may relocate ships from American ports in order to operate again.

The CDC has indicated a summer restart is possible but issued guidance last week that didn’t specify when operators can resume sailing out of the U.S. following a long shutdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki pushed back when a reporter asked about Norwegian’s effort to resume operations on the Fourth of July, the holiday when President Joe Biden has predicted Americans could safely gather at least in small groups.

Biden’s announcement on July 4 has nothing to do with cruise lines. As you know, it has to do with incentivizing, encouraging Americans to get access to the vaccine, when they can get vaccinated.

So that’s more about small gatherings in your backyards, which is quite different from cruises in this sense, of course.

It’s up to the CDC to determine guidelines for the cruise industry and then update them. The CDC does not anticipate that, but would defer to them on any expectation they have of changing those guidelines.

Again, they base them on health and medical experts who work at the CDC. They base them on certified data.

The press secretary declined to comment on a lawsuit filed by the state of Florida against the Biden administration aiming to quickly get cruise lines operating again from U.S. ports.

Today, Florida’s fighting back,” the state’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, said as he announced the legal action, according to an Orlando Sentinel report.

We don’t believe the federal government has the right to mothball a major industry for over a year based on very little evidence and very little data.

Market-Watch / ABC Flash Point News 2021.