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“We didn’t see Delta coming,” Ms. Harris told the newspaper. “I think most scientists did not — upon whose advice and direction we have relied — didn’t see Delta coming. We didn’t see Omicron coming. And that’s the nature of what this, this awful virus has been, which as it turns out, has mutations and variants.”

Mr. Biden has both sounded an alarm over Omicron this month while also counseling hope in the face of it, expressing optimism that the fast-spreading variant would not set back the progress the country has made to regain a sense of normalcy in recent months.

After initially imposing a set of travel restrictions on certain countries, including South Africa, where the variant was first detected, Mr. Biden’s response to the variant has leaned heavily on imploring Americans to get vaccinated, including booster shots.

For the unvaccinated, the president said on Thursday, “we are looking at a winter of severe illness and death — if you’re unvaccinated — for themselves, their families, and the hospitals they’ll soon overwhelm. But there’s good news: If you’re vaccinated and you had your booster shot, you’re protected from severe illness and death — period.”

Ms. Psaki has fielded repeated questions in recent weeks over whether administration officials had revised their economic forecasts to account for Omicron. On Friday, she told reporters aboard Air Force One en route to South Carolina that federal surge teams were helping communities handle a surge in cases in hard-hit states like Colorado, Michigan and Vermont.