Underpaid and over-opinionated: Republican House staffers are not putting up with a new mask mandate.
On Tuesday, the US House attending physician reinstated a draconian mask mandate amid the Delta variant’s ‘rise’ — about 50 new cases per 100,000, scary stuff. The order follows the new CDC guidance which tells vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals to wear masks indoors and out.
‘For all House Office Buildings, the Hall of the House and House Committee Meetings, wearing of a well-fitted, medical grade, filtration face mask is required when an individual is in an interior space and other individuals are present,’ said Dr Brian Monahan in a memo released Tuesday. In order to enter the House chamber, lawmakers and their staff will be required to wear face coverings. Those who fail to do so will be subject to fines. The rule does not apply to the Senate side — which some have speculated is due to a higher vaccination rate and lower headcount. Instead Monahan only ‘suggested’ that ‘well-fitted, medical-grade filtration’ be worn on the Senate side of the building.
Cockburn spoke with Republican House staffers who plan to defy all face-covering requirements.
‘I’m not following it. And the physically healthy Republican staffers who do are mentally broken. Pelosi now controls their face too. Sad,’ said one Capitol Hill communications director. Another staffer told Cockburn, ‘Absolutely not. This is political theater.’
The youth rebellion is influencing their bosses on Capitol Hill. On Tuesday night Nate Madden, the communications director for Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, tweeted a simple ‘lol no’ in response to the new rules.
Lol no. https://t.co/33rrNs7rmt
— Nate Madden (@NateOnTheHill) July 28, 2021
The next day Roy ‘threw a DEFCON-1 tantrum’ on the House Floor over the mandate, according to Esquire. Roy demanded lawmakers pay a little more attention to the illegal immigrants flooding across the southern border and a little less to facial fabric:
‘We have a crisis at our border and we are playing footsie with mask mandates in the people’s house. It’s absolutely absurd what this body is doing, the people’s house. It’s an embarrassment, a mockery and the American people are fed up.’
‘I have no interest in being a political pawn,’ one staffer texted Cockburn.
Another claimed the mandate would only lead to more vaccine hesitancy.
‘I am fully vaccinated, under 30, in great health with no preexisting conditions. I also do not live or interact with anyone that the above conditions apply,’ said the unnamed Hill staffer. ‘The attending physician did a good job rolling out the vaccines at the beginning of the year, but the recent change in guidance completely undermines that. This will only lead to more hesitancy from the broader public, and it was clearly politically driven.’
Cockburn can’t blame House staffers for wanting to tear up the rules. Six months ago, a mob of boomers tried to trash their place of work; before that, dozens of BLM rioters almost burnt down their city. Now overzealous doctors want to seal their mouth-hole shut. If any jobs open up in the Senate, now would be the time to apply. Because God knows COVID can’t travel to that side of the building — for now.
