White House chief of staff refuses to wear mask while talking to reporters
WASHINGTON – White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows refused to keep his mask on when speaking to reporters at the Capitol building Monday, saying he would not "talk through a mask".
Meadows, who was on Capitol Hill for the beginning of the confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, insisted that by pulling the microphone farther away from the reporters, he could remove his face covering.
"I’m more than 10 feet away... that way I can take this off,” Meadows told reporters.
After CNN's Kristin Wilson asked him to put it back on, Meadows replaced the mask and walked away, saying, “I’m not going to talk through a mask.”
Mark Meadows wouldn’t talk to me with his mask on. https://t.co/riaMquO39Y
— Kristin Wilson (@kristin__wilson) October 12, 2020
Meadows is among the White House officials who have regularly and directly interacted with President Donald Trump since he tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this month.
Meadows had his own office space at Walter Reed medical center, where the president stayed for a few days to battle COVID-19. Meadows — reportedly wearing a mask and other personal protective equipment — has also been with the president since Trump returned to the Oval Office.
Meadows said he tested negative for the virus as of Monday.
The president and first lady, Melania Trump, are just a few of the people who tested positive for the coronavirus after a large outbreak at the White House.
More: White House coronavirus outbreak may have exposed thousands from Atlanta to Minnesota
More: Which members of Congress have tested positive for COVID-19?
This is not the first time Meadows has made headlines for disregarding safety guidelines during the pandemic.
In May, he hosted a 70-person indoor wedding for his daughter in Atlanta despite coronavirus lockdowns and local ordinances that blocked large gatherings.
Hours after Trump’s COVID-19 diagnosis, Meadows addressed reporters outside the White House without a mask, saying when why he was not wearing a mask, “Yeah. So I’ve obviously been tested, we’re hopefully more than six feet away. And if there’s any concern there, from a guidance standpoint, we have protocols in place.”
More: President Trump and his staff defied CDC coronavirus guidelines 27 times since Sept. 1
To prevent the spread of the disease that has killed more than 215,000 people in the U.S., the CDC recommends that people should wear masks in public settings, especially when around people who don’t live in the same household.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mark Meadows refuses to wear mask to talk to reporters on Capitol Hill
