Biden pushes for mask mandate
Presidential candidate calls for nationwide protective mask requirement as the pandemic continues.
WILMINGTON, Del. — Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden called for a nationwide protective mask mandate, citing health experts’ predictions that it could save 40,000 lives from coronavirus over the next three months.
“Wearing the mask is less about you contracting the virus,” Biden said Thursday. “It’s about preventing other people from getting sick.”
Biden also responded to those who push back against such mandates.
“This is America. Be a patriot. Protect your fellow citizens. Step up, do the right thing,” he said.
“Every single American should be wearing a mask when they’re outside for the next three months at a minimum — every governor should mandate mandatory mask wearing,” Biden declared.
President Donald Trump on Wednesday said at a press briefing that his administration was sending 125 million reusable masks to school districts across the nation. He urged Americans to wear masks but has opposed the idea of a national requirement and declined to wear one for months. He has worn one on occasion more recently.
On Thursday, he again dismissed critics who say he was too slow to react to the pandemic in the U.S., saying on Fox Business Network that “nobody blames me.”
“Look, we got hit by the China plague and we’re not going to forget it. We got hit by the China plague,” he said.
On Wednesday, when the U.S. reported 1,499 new coronavirus deaths, the highest number of COVID-19 deaths in a single day since May, Trump pushed for schools and businesses to continue opening, and called for college football to go on despite several leading leagues’ leaders deciding to cancel this year’s season.
Biden and Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif. spoke briefly Thursday in the same Delaware hotel ballroom where they held a virtual fundraiser after appearing together as running mates for the first time
Wednesday.
In a rarity, former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen was among a team of advisers who briefed Biden and Harris about the economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, which has caused the deaths of nearly 167,000 Americans and plunged the global economy into the worst economic recession since World War II.
Biden and Harris participated in the briefing from separate, socially distanced tables.
Yellen’s participation was notable because Fed officials typically avoid overt partisan politics — even after they leave the central bank — to preserve the institution’s independence.
Yellen was nominated to lead the central bank by Barack Obama and served from 2014 to 2018, when President Donald Trump declined to nominate her for another term.
Word of Yellen advising Biden is also significant because Biden’s campaign had previously been guarded about who was providing it economic expertise.