At least 10 Republican congressmen rebelled Tuesday against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) requirement that members wear masks on the floor of the House of Representatives or pay a fine.
“We’ve had enough,” Representative Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) tweeted at the time. “We are refusing to wear our masks on the floor during this vote in spite of Pelosi’s threat to take $500 from each of us.”
About half an hour later, the congressman, who has a 98-percent lifetime score on The New American’s Freedom Index, reported that “5 Republican women and 5 Republican men are now maskless on the floor.”
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene tweeted a photo of herself with Massie and Representatives Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) and Mary Miller (R-Ill.), adding, “Masks are oppressive and nothing but a political tool. End the oppression!” Miller posted the same photo with the words “Enough is enough!” Both included the hashtag #FreeYourFace.
Representative Brian Mast (R-Fla.) refused to comply with the mask rule even when approached by a member of the House Sergeant at Arms’ office while C-SPAN telecast House proceedings. “I am listening to the CDC scientists,” he later tweeted. “Why isn’t [Pelosi]?”
Mast was referring to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) recent announcement that individuals who have been vaccinated against COVID-19 no longer need to wear masks indoors. Despite the CDC’s updated guidance and Republican pleas, Pelosi has refused to lift her mask mandate until all House members have been vaccinated; the Capitol’s attending physician estimates the current vaccination rate is 75 percent.
According to The Hill, “House members are required to wear masks on the floor, but can remove them when recognized to speak during debate or while presiding over proceedings.”
That, of course, proves what a sham Pelosi’s mask mandate is. Perhaps the most convincing evidence, however, came from Massie, who revealed in one tweet that the speaker’s “rule is not based on science. All you need to know is the mask rule has only ever applied to members when they can be seen on TV!”
In other words, it’s all for show. And unlike their counterparts in the Senate, who have never implemented a similar mandate, House Democrats are serious about making the public believe all congressmen are wearing masks at all times. “Democrats voted in January to levy fines — $500 for the first offense and $2,500 for the second — on any lawmaker who refuses to wear masks on the House floor,” reported The Hill. “The monetary enforcement came after several Republicans did not wear masks while lawmakers who had evacuated from the House chamber on Jan. 6 were crowded together in a secure space.”
Three of Tuesday’s maskless congressmen were fined $500 for their intransigence: Mast, Representative Beth Van Duyne (R-Texas), and Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-Iowa).
“Best $500 I ever spent,” Mast told NBC News.
Massie, Greene, Miller, and Representatives Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), Chip Roy (R-Texas), Bob Good (R-Va.), and Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) were issued first-offense warnings. “If these lawmakers defy the rules again,” wrote The Hill, “they could face $500 fines. Subsequent offenses would result in $2,500 fines.”
Yet why not give congressmen and their staffers a choice? Those who are vaccinated should feel safe going unmasked given the CDC’s latest guidance. Those who are not vaccinated are surely aware of the risks of going in public places without a mask. (Those risks happen to be minimal given the coronavirus’ overwhelming survival rate and the fact that, as the CDC knew a year ago, masks do not have “a substantial effect on transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza.”) As Mast put it when a Democratic colleague told him it was “on you” if he suffered consequences for defying Pelosi’s dictate, “It’s definitely on us if we choose not to wear a mask. I’m glad we agree.”
In fact, as Greene observed, the mask rule is “nothing but a political tool,” as should be obvious from Pelosi’s unwillingness to repeal it even as the House vaccination rate soars and the threat, such as it was, from COVID-19 diminishes.
“Now that ‘the science’ has determined that mask-wearing is no longer necessary,” asked LewRockwell.com blogger Daniel McAdams, “can we start claiming that Pelosi and the Democrats are ‘anti-science’?”
