Biden Set to Push Mask Mandate in Outreach to Local Authorities

In spit of President Trump’s legal challenges to several key electoral outcomes, Joe Biden is moving forward under the operation assumption that he will be back in the Oval Office come January 20th.

At the very top of Biden’s priority list is the coronavirus pandemic that has largely hobbled our nation, and the world, for nearly 10 months now.  The former Vice President has already announced the formation of a COVID-19 advisory board, and he and Kamala Harris made a big show of holding a Zoom call briefing with these experts on Monday.

Biden has long been a proponent of face masks as a tool to prevent the spread of COVID-19, but has waffled on whether or not a national mask mandate is the best way to promote their use.  Now it appears as though he’ll lean on local authorities to push the idea.

President-electJoe Biden will personally call on governors around the country to enact mask mandates in their states once taking office next year, NBC News first reported on Sunday.

A Biden campaign official told the network that governors who resist the incoming president’s requests will see Biden pressure mayors of cities in their respective states to enact mandates at the local level, potentially setting him up for confrontations with Republican governors around the U.S.

“If a governor declines, he’ll go to the mayors in the state and ask them to lead,” said the official, according to NBC. “In many states there is the capacity of mayors to institute mandates.”

Biden attempted to portray the wearing of masks as non-political, ignoring the reality that many on the right side of the aisle take offense to the idea that their personal freedoms would be subject to oppression should they be forced into donning the protective coverings.