Democrats suddenly reverse course on mask mandates
Biden and the White House, though, have refused to budge, despite numerous blue-state governors ordering mask mandates to end immediately or within two weeks.
Blue-state governors are dropping mask mandates across the country, but irrationally are waiting to life school mandates despite the mounting evidence is the children who suffer the most mental health and socialization issues by being forced to wear masks. (Photo: Don Foglemann/Associated Press) _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
For months, health experts at odds with the government healthcare bureaucracy have been saying that masks don’t work, pointing to studies dating all the way back to the 1918-19 Spanish Flu pandemic to support those views. Additionally, as America’s Conservative Voice has reported, children’s mental health suffers by being forced to wear masks six to eight hours per day. Democrats across the country are scrambling to reverse course on their CCP virus restrictions as this year's midterm elections loom.
With the notable exception of the White House, Democrats at every level are signaling their support for returning to normal as polls show Americans are weary of coronavirus restrictions, which Republican states have largely done away with.
According to a recent poll by Monmouth University, 70 percent of Americans say it’s time for the country to move on from the pandemic, and a decreasing number of Americans support Wuhan virus-related mandates. Biden’s approval ratings on handling COVID, once a strength, are also now underwater, with 43 percent approving and 53 percent disapproving, according to the poll. Overall, for the first time in its history, the Real Clear Politics overall approval averages for Biden or any other president are under 40 percent.
Biden has chosen to follow the lead of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which still recommends universal masking indoors and in schools.
Two of the administration’s top doctors — Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the president’s chief medical adviser for the pandemic, and Dr. Rochelle P. Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, both expressed qualified optimism on Wednesday about the direction of the pandemic. If cases continue to fall and no new variants arise, the country “could be heading toward what we would consider more normality,” Dr. Fauci said in an interview.
But Dr. Fauci cautioned that the situation “is still unpredictable,” and said any transition out of the current crisis would be gradual. And Dr. Walensky said pointedly that while her agency is working on new guidance for the states, it is too soon for all Americans to take off their masks in indoor public places.
“Our hospitalizations are still high, our death rates are still high,” she said during a news briefing by the White House Covid response team. “So, as we work toward that and as we are encouraged by the current trends, we are not there yet.”
Walensky’s claim that hospitalizations are “still high” is an outright lie, and she knows it. For the first time in three months, total day-to-day hospitalizations in the U.S. dropped below 100,000 on Monday.
The gubernatorial frenzy to drop mask mandates comes as the White House Covid response coordinator, Jeffrey D. Zients, and the government’s top doctors are soliciting advice from a wide array of public health experts, including some former Biden advisers who have very publicly urged the president to shift course. Mr. Zients referenced the sessions briefly on Wednesday, saying the White House is also reaching out to governors and local public health officials to talk about “steps we should be taking to keep the country moving forward.”
Despite blue-state governors planning to lift mask mandates over the next two weeks, the Biden cabal remained solidly in denial, holding fast to the idea that Americans still need to wear masks in public, in schools and even in their own homes. (Photo: Chip Somodville/Getty Images) _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Biden and the White House, though, have refused to budge, despite the blue state governors who are backing off the mask mandates and many are not enforcing the vaccine mandate ordered by Biden in March.
It is as though the Fascist Left Democrats suddenly realized it is an election year. Leftist governors have held fast to the controls they were given during the height of the CCP virus pandemic. But with the midterms ahead, many Democrats who once led the way in issuing lockdown orders and mandates over the course of the pandemic are easing restrictions in their states in defiance of the Biden cabal.
Not the least bit surprising, it is the swing state Democrats who are abandoning Biden’s irrational mask guidelines. They can read the polls. They see the American people are fed up with restrictions, masks, lockdowns and vaccine hysteria. If the current governors won’t give them relief, they will elect ones who will.
Swing states like Michigan, Colorado and Pennsylvania were among the first Democrat-led states to loosen COVID-19 restrictions last year. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who is up for reelection this year, implemented some of the strictest COVID-19 orders in the country in 2020, including banning travel between two residences and the selling of non-essential goods. She lifted most of her restrictions last summer and has since pushed vaccinations as the best way to slow the spread.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis, who is also up for reelection, has taken a similar approach and refused to implement any new mandates.
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf, who is unable to run again this year, leaving his seat up for grabs, said in December, "Local municipalities, as you know, I think ought to be free to do with what they want," echoing what many Republicans like Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) have been saying for two years, only to be vilified in the Leftist media.
Less than a year ago, Biden said the lifting of mask mandates in Republican-led states amounted to "Neanderthal thinking."
The rapid jumping ship on mask mandates is not limited to just swing states, either. Numerous blue state governors this week have announced that they are rolling back coronavirus restrictions, and prominent congressional Democrats have also signaled their support for returning to normal.
Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) announced that her state will end its COVID-19 mandate requiring face coverings in most indoor public settings but will keep it for schools. Illinois announced the same.
Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee, a Democrat up for reelection this year, joined a number of other blue-state governors Wednesday in announcing he will end the indoor vaccine-or-mask order this week, with schools to folow in March. (Screenshot: WNAC-TV12/Providence) _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Gov. Dan McKee (D-RI) said Wednesday his state will end its indoor vaccine-or-mask requirement this week, followed by the school mask mandate in March. Massachusetts, which is generally considered a blue state but has a centrist Republican governor, will end its school mask mandate at the end of the month.
Earlier this week, New Jersey, Connecticut and Delaware all disclosed plans to join states that have lifted or never had mask requirements for their schools.
The movement to "move on" from the pandemic appears to have sped up in recent days as new coronavirus cases decrease following the omicron variant surge. Also expediting matters: A new Johns Hopkins study saying the lockdowns of 2020 did little to curb the COVID-19 death rate and a new guidance Friday by the CDC saying the popular cloth masks accepted by most mandates are the least effective in preventing the spread.
As many conservatives have been saying for months, the CCP virus pandemic is largely over, with the Omicron variant being the weakest form of the disease to appear, though it appears to remain deadly for those with comorbidity such as obesity, heart or lung disease and dementia. Many news and opinion outlets, including America’s Conservative Voice, have been calling for a return to normalcy as the virus enters an endemic phase.
Gov. Phil Murphy (D-NJ), who barely eked out a win in the reliably blue Garden State in November, was the first to lift his school mask mandate this week after the new CDC guidance, and Democratic governors in California, Delaware, Oregon, Connecticut and New York quickly followed course.
"We are not going to manage COVID to zero," Murphy said Monday on Twitter. "We have to learn how to live with COVID as we move from a pandemic to an endemic phase of this virus."
"Our statewide indoor mask requirement will expire on 2/15," Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), who is up for reelection this fall, tweeted Monday. "Unvaccinated people will still need to wear masks indoors."
"Oregonians have stepped up during the omicron surge — wearing masks, getting vaccinated and boosted and keeping each other safe," Gov. Kate Brown (D-OR), who is unable to run for reelection announced Monday. "Because of your actions, Oregon will lift mask requirements no later than March 31."
"We are lifting DE's statewide mask mandate for indoor public settings at 8am on Friday, Feb 11," Delaware Gov. John Carney tweeted Monday. "The mask requirement in K-12 public & private schools and child care facilities expires at 11:59pm on Thursday, March 31."
Even Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) stated publicly Wednesday that “the people are ready to pivot” away from pandemic fear and doubt. (Photo: John Leguasse/Reuters) _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
"It’s about time to end the statewide school mask mandate and enable each local boards of education to decide what is best for their schools," Gov. Ted Lamont (D-CT) who is up for reelection, tweeted Wednesday.
"At this time, we say that it’s the right decision to lift this mandate for indoor businesses and let counties, cities and businesses to make their own decisions on what they want to do with respect to mask or vaccination requirement,” said Gov. Hochul of New York, who is running to keep the governor's seat, said Wednesday, dropping her state’s "mask or vax" mandate for businesses.
The shift in Democratic messaging surrounding the pandemic was buoyed in part by Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s (R-VA) upset win in Virginia in November over former Democrat Gov. Terry McAuliffe. Focus group findings by Third Way, a think tank aligned with Democrats, found that swing voters who voted for Youngkin over McAuliffe were motivated by CCP virus restrictions and school closures even more so than critical race theory being taught in the classroom..
House Democrats' reelection arm has picked up on this messaging ahead of the midterms, where Democrats face an uphill battle to hold onto their razor-thin majorities in the House and Senate.
"Democrats' plan to fight COVID is working — cases are down & vaccines are widely available," Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-NY), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, tweeted Wednesday. "Now, it's time to give people their lives back. With science as our guide, we're ready to start getting back to normal."
Even “Iron Nancy,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) chimed in Wednesday, saying, "People are ready to pivot" from the pandemic.
It’s a stark contrast to what the radical Left Fascists were saying just a month ago when Youngkin banned school mask mandates in Virginia.
"Kids will die," CNN political pundit Joe Lockhart tweeted three weeks ago.
Despite the relaxing of COVID restrictions by multiple Democratic governors, Biden is sticking by the CDC, and White House press secretary Jen Psaki has downplayed any apparent conflict between the governors and his administration. On Wednesday, reporters pressed Psaki on why the administration appears to be one step behind Biden's fellow Democrats.
"Our guidance has consistently been this," Psaki said. "When you are in a high-transmission area, which is everywhere in the country, you should wear a mask in indoor settings, including schools."
Apparently, like the CDC and NIH, the White House hasn’t read the polls ― or the tea leaves. We The People are fed up and will speak with one voice come November.
Mike Nichols is an advocate of the counterrevolution with a four-step plan to defeat Leftist Fascism: We Organize. We Stand. We Resist. We Fight. He is a regular contributor to several conservative news websites and has a regular blog and Facebook presence at Americas Conservative Voice-Facebook.