Vice President Mike Pence has clearly learned a lot of things from Donald Trump. And on Tuesday he chose to put one of them on display:
When you have power, flaunt it.
Pence, who chairs the White House Coronavirus Task Force, got a VIP tour of the famed Mayo Clinic in Rochester MN and chose to ignore the clinic’s mandatory rule for wearing a face mask to guard against spreading the virus.
“Video feeds show that Pence did not wear a mask when he met with a Mayo employee who has recovered from COVID-19 and is now donating plasma, even though everyone else in the room appeared to be wearing one,” reports the Associated Press.
“He was also maskless when he visited a lab where Mayo conducts coronavirus tests,” as well as at a roundtable discussion of Mayo’s virus-related programs.
The clinic informed Pence of its mandatory masking policy prior to his visit, Mayo said in a tweet that was quickly deleted — apparently on orders from Pence or his staff.
President Trump recently announced guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommending that people wear cloth face masks in public settings where social distancing may be difficult to maintain.
But Trump won’t do it himself — and there’s the lesson for Pence.
