Vice President Mike Pence was recently criticized for not wearing a face mask during a visit to the Mayo Clinic, but most staffers and officials at the White House have declined to wear masks while working.
“It’s a personal choice — that’s the whole point of the guidelines in the first place,” one unnamed White House official told Raw Story. “If you want to wear one, you can wear one. It’s not a conscious effort to try and raise the alarm or not raise the alarm.”
Another staffer said, “I don’t wear one when I’m here, but I take an Uber back and forth to work every day because the Metro and buses are so terrible right now. But when I’m here on complex, just sitting at my desk, in a meeting where there’s plenty of distance, I don’t wear one.”
Pence told reporters after his visit that he didn’t wear a mask because he’s “tested for the coronavirus on a regular basis,” as are the people around him, and he wanted to meet health care workers “and look them in the eye and say ‘thank you.’”
The vice president later wore a mask while touring a General Motors plant that is making ventilators.
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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