Joe Biden and his handlers love to assert that they are simply “following the science” when it comes to defending their draconian COVID policies. However, as many conservatives and others truly following the science observe, it’s political gamesmanship rather than scientific data that directs Biden’s COVID response.

The latest instance of politicization came a couple weeks back when Biden announced boosters would be offered to all inoculated Americans ages 16 and up. With the lasting effectiveness of novel COVID vaccines apparently diminishing over a mere few months, and just as the Delta variant has caused a spike in new cases across much of the country, the plan from the Biden administration was to make sure millions of people got a third jab.

Well, a pretty sizable wrinkle was thrown into the plan when a U.S. Food and Drug Administration advisory panel overwhelming voted against a booster for anyone under the age of 65 except for those with a high risk of serious disease. The 18-member panel voted 16-2 to reject recommending the booster to younger, healthier Americans, though the panel did vote 18-0 in favor of recommending a booster to Americans 65 and older.

The main reasons cited by the FDA panel was the lack of safety data and the questionable value of hitting everyone with boosters versus a more targeted approach. In a letter to the Biden administration explaining its decision, the panel wrote: “Current evidence does not … appear to show a need for boosting in the general population, in which efficacy against severe disease remains high. Even if humoral immunity appears to wane, reductions in neutralising antibody titre do not necessarily predict reductions in vaccine efficacy over time, and reductions in vaccine efficacy against mild disease do not necessarily predict reductions in the (typically higher) efficacy against severe disease.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is also expected to offer its opinion on boosters this week, but it is rumored to be leaning toward the FDA panel’s recommendation of the targeted approach.

Unsurprisingly, Biden got ahead of the “science” on this. His administration had already scheduled September 20 (today) as the start date for rolling out boosters, clearly expecting to get a rubber stamp from the FDA. But there had been warning signs coming out of the FDA that Biden’s booster push was not going over well. Two top FDA officials resigned over the issue, with Politico characterizing their objections as “lack of autonomy” and feeling “cut out of key decisions,” all in service to a plan they thought was “premature and unnecessary.”

Biden may have won the 2020 election in large part by convincing American voters that Donald Trump had mishandled the crisis, but it was Trump who delivered the vaccines and Biden who politicized them. That gross politicization is now costing him and the country dearly.