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Joe Biden isn’t planning to follow the decision by D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser to end the indoor mask requirement.
White House assistant press secretary Kevin Munoz responded, “The White House follows CDC guidance which recommends masking in areas of high or substantial transmission.”
Offices and retail spaces no longer have an indoor mask requirement, Bowser announced.
This rule had been in place since July 2020, but it is no longer legally required.
“We are encouraged by the numbers that have opted into vaccination now, some of them encouraged by mandates,” Bowser said.
“There may even be an increase in cases … but what we haven’t seen is an increase in hospitalizations and deaths. That is the promise of vaccination.”
Private businesses are allowed to require masks if they choose, but this isn’t a legal mandate.
“My mask,” Joe Biden said after delivering a speech outside. Biden is fully vaccinated with a booster shot.
Biden returns to the podium, but fails to put the mask on when he realizes nobody else is wearing them.
Watch the clip:
"My mask," Joe Biden, fully vaccinated with a booster shot, says after finishing his speech.
He goes back to the podium to retrieve it and then doesn't put it on when he realizes nobody else is wearing them. pic.twitter.com/8fshP5vebU
— X Strategies LLC (@XStrategiesLLC) November 15, 2021
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The city will still require masks in specific indoor settings, including schools and childcare facilities, congregate facilities and D.C. government facilities.
Bowser said that moving forward, the city will “create guidance based on risk levels and the use of layered mitigation strategies.”
But still requiring masks in congregate facilities could also open up the city to more lawsuits, having already paid out $220,000 to Capitol Hill Baptist Church earlier this year after the church sued the city over COVID-19 mandates it said restricted in-person worship.
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