Tag: face masks

New York Gov. Hochul: School Mask Mandate Can Be Lifted When ‘Parents Do the Right Thing’ and Vaccinate Their Children

The school mask mandate in New York State can only be lifted after parents “do the right thing” and vaccinate their children, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) suggested this week.

Interim guidance for in-person instruction, issued June 7, 2021, states that masks should be required in school facilities, requiring them to be “worn by all individuals in all classroom and non-classroom settings, including but not limited to hallways, school offices, restrooms, gyms, auditoriums, etc.”

While masks are not required outdoors, schools may choose to require them in such scenarios. 

Currently, there is no end in sight for the school mask mandate. Rather, Hochul is placing the burden on the parents, suggesting the they must get their children vaccinated if they want to return to a state of maskless, pre-pandemic normalcy. 

“If parents do the right thing all over the state, get their kids vaccinated. There will come a time when there’s no reason to wear a mask, that every child is safe. But we need compliance,” she said during an appearance on WNYW’s Good Day New York this week.

“And in some communities it’s stronger than others. So let’s get the kids vaccinated. I don’t have a date. I’m not going to prejudge this,” she said, failing to even offer a rough timeline and suggestion it all hinges on compliance. “There’s no way I can know.”

“I need to know how people are doing, are a lot of people getting vaccinated, or is there an early rush and then it plateaus and then half the kids in the class aren’t protected. That’s what I’m watching. I’m always driven by the numbers. So that’s why I can’t say, ‘on this date, we’re going to do X,’” Hochul added.

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Feds creating comic books to push COVID masks, fight disinformation on 5G and elections

Colorado voters perusing their Secretary of State Web site ahead of this week’s elections are directed in the “What You Can Do” section to a most-unexpected resource: a comic book purporting to educate them on “deep fakes,” “troll farms” and “election misinformation.”

If the tool isn’t surprising enough to voters, its publisher just may be: It’s Uncle Sam.

Since October 2020, the Homeland Security Department’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has published two “graphic novels” aimed at combatting what it sees as two dangerous myths in America: Elections can be stolen and 5G towers have a connection to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The ranking Republican on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs said the comic books are powerful examples of ideology being placed ahead of security.

“When I helped pass the bill to rename CISA, the intent was to help the agency focus on Cyber and Infrastructure security, not establish itself as a comic book publisher or the Ministry of Truth,” Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., told Just the News on Sunday “This is just one more sad example of what America gets with Democrat governance: less security, more nanny state.”

CISA declined to say how much taxpayer money was spent on the comic books, but defends the work. 

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Gov. Whitmer Caught Maskless at DC Bar in Violation of Mandates

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) was caught maskless at a Washington, D.C. cocktail bar Friday night, just hours before pulling out of Virginia Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe’s door-knocking campaign scheduled for the following morning, in her latest violation of COVID-19 policies.

Video obtained by The Washington Free Beacon shows Whitmer maskless in the standing-room-only section of the crowded bar at the Hotel Washington.

A hotel employee told the news outlet that bar guests must wear face coverings when not actively eating or drinking, neither of which Whitmer was doing. Several people congregating near her, however, were wearing masks.

The governor was also in violation of Washington, D.C.’s local mask mandate, reinstated in July by Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) amid a spike of coronavirus cases caused by the highly infectious delta variant. Restaurants and other establishments that fail to enforce Bowser’s order face potential warnings, fines and the revocation of licenses.

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Vaccinated Children Likely Still Have to Wear Masks in School, Surgeon General Says

Indoor mask mandates at schools will likely to stay in place even after young children receive COVID-19 vaccines in the coming weeks, said U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy.

In an Oct. 21 interview on CNN’s “New Day,” Murthy was asked how much the vaccination of children ages 5-11 would affect the need of having them wear masks in the classroom. He replied that those who are vaccinated may still need to wear a mask until the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) says otherwise.

“The CDC has guidance currently says even if you are vaccinated, you do need to wear a mask,” Murthy said. “That will likely be the case for children until the CDC changes it.”

He then advised parents that having their kids vaccinated “reduces the pressure” to quarantine them when they are exposed to the virus.

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Nevada Democrat Violates State Mask Mandate at Star-Studded Gala Honoring Chinese Billionaire

Rep. Susie Lee (D., Nev.) keeps violating her state’s indoor mask mandate. Photographic evidence obtained by the Washington Free Beacon shows the congresswoman partying without a mask for the second time in as many months, putting countless lives at risk with her irresponsible behavior.

Lee was spotted dancing at the Power of Love Gala in Las Vegas on Oct. 16. She wasn’t wearing a mask, even though Gov. Steve Sisolak (D., Nev.) imposed a state mandate that requires the use of masks in “indoor public settings,” regardless of vaccination status. Sisolak’s office did not return a request for comment on the reckless violation.

The ritzy gala, sponsored by Moët Hennessy, was thrown in honor of K.T. Lim, a Chinese-Malaysian billionaire. Lim’s company developed Resorts World Las Vegas, which hosted the celebrity-packed affair, where guests dined on “gourmet cuisine from celebrity chefs Wolfgang Puck and Bobby Flay,” and could bid on “luxury auction items” such as dinner with Jon Bon Jovi, a chess match with opera singer Andrea Bocelli, and a Lamborghini. Other VIP attendees included Demi Lovato, Jordin Sparks, and A.J. McLean of the Backstreet Boys.

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Universities Deputize Students As Mask Police To Snitch On Peers For Money

How much would you have to be paid to commit social suicide? What if a paycheck wasn’t the only perk, but it also entitled you to a sickening sense of self-righteousness and an air of superiority? 

This appears to be the tradeoff many college students have made this semester as universities’ “Student Health Ambassadors,” paid adult hall monitors whose job is to patrol their campuses and enforce mask policies and distancing regulations. Several different institutions have opened this position, each one slightly different but all giving students authority over their peers in the name of public health. 

One of the most egregious examples comes from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), where student Covid commissars have been given the authority to “break up social gatherings” and to check students’ “clearance certificates.” Students who violate COVID policies can face suspension and expulsion. The enforcers, who are paid $15 an hour, even don vests and T-shirts emblazoned with the health ambassador logo. 

Other universities have taken similar approaches. The school that I attend, Pepperdine University, has launched a program to “train and deploy” students to “monitor” their peers for “COVID-19 policy compliance,” a gig that conveniently comes with a high visibility bright blue T-shirt. Pepperdine has also decided to use the carrot instead of just the stick, now giving out raffle tickets to those who are wearing masks. 

Similar “health ambassador” positions have opened up at various universities, including at the University of Rochester, the University of California at Davis, New York University, Penn State, and the Washington University in St. Louis, where the student workers wear yellow shirts bearing the phrase “If you can read this, you’re too close” and an elite division has been dispatched to be “cubby monitors” who monitor private study rooms.

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‘Coffee cup Gestapo’: Australian cops slammed for checking man’s beverage to verify his excuse for not wearing Covid-19 mask

Video footage of Melbourne police checking whether a man’s coffee cup was empty to verify his excuse for not wearing a mask is stirring the latest round of online outrage over Australia’s dystopian Covid-19 policies.

While it is unclear when exactly the video was recorded, the clip went viral on social media on Friday and Saturday, showing several police officers confronting a man on what appears to be a park trail. One of the officers grabs the man’s coffee cup while asking, “Do you mind if I check if there’s actually anything in that?” He shakes the cup, and after apparently establishing that there was liquid inside, he backs away and tells the man, “Enjoy your coffee.”

The 10-second clip ends with the coffee drinker telling the police, “Jesus loves you all. God bless. I’ll be praying for you all.”

While the parkgoer dealt with the confrontation calmly and cordially, and it remains unclear when exactly the footage was recorded, online observers expressed shock over yet another example of Australia’s apparent Covid-19 “authoritarianism.”

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More COVID Hypocrisy: NJ Governor Appears Maskless at Indoor Ball After Mandating Masks for Students

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) was seen without a mask at an indoor ball, just weeks after he implemented a mask mandate for school children.

The Equality Ball, an annual fundraiser for Garden State Equality, a nonprofit LGBTQ+ advocacy group, took place Thursday, when Murphy, leaders of New Jersey Education Association and other officials were caught without masks.

State Senator Holly Schepisi said that the maskless event is the type of hypocrisy “that is driving people in New Jersey insane.”

“At the very same time that this Governor issued another EO mandating two year olds wear masks for upwards of 7 hours a day because of purported ‘safety,’ the New Jersey political democratic elite gathered maskless by the thousands at multiple indoor events throughout the State, including in “high-risk” Asbury Park, Bergen and Hudson Counties,” Schepisi said in a statement to Fox News.

“The people of New Jersey are being told by this administration that they must comply, don’t ask questions or get labeled a knucklehead or worse while those demanding compliance flout the very policies they push,” she continued. “It is wrong.”

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16-Year-Old Wyoming Student Arrested for Not Wearing Mask, Entire School Placed on Lockdown

A 16-year-old student in Wyoming was arrested and the entire school was placed  on lockdown — all because she refused to wear a mask.

Grace Smith, 16, had already been suspended twice from Laramie High School in Wyoming for refusing to wear masks in class.

As the brave student attempted to go to class unmuzzled once again, she was met with police and given a $500 citation. When she was told to leave the school, she refused to comply. At that point, she was handcuffed and arrested.

As the situation unfolded, an announcement over the loudspeaker said that “we are in a lockdown, please stay in your rooms.”

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