All public schools in New Jersey will require students, faculty, and visitors to wear face masks in the fall amid a spike in delta variant coronavirus cases, Gov. Phil Murphy announced Friday.
“The health and safety of our kids is among if not the most important responsibility, as it is for any governor,” Murphy said during a press conference. “There are issues that are and must always remain above politics, and this is one of them.”
“Anyone telling you that we can safely reopen our schools without requiring everyone inside to wear [a mask] is quite simply lying to you,” he added. “Because we can’t.”
The governor prefers that students not wear the masks “as much as anybody,” but he is requiring them to help keep schools open and minimize the risks of students getting sick, he said.
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Murphy continued: “Our schools will open for full-time, in-person instruction, as previously announced. We remain steadfast in the recognition that our children learn better in a classroom setting tailored for their educations.”
NJ’s Gov. @PhilMurphyNJ: “Anyone telling you that we can safely reopen our schools without requiring everyone inside to wear is quite simply lying to you. Because we can’t.” pic.twitter.com/SQNSVGQueJ
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) August 6, 2021
The stance seems to be a reversal from a stance the governor held in June when he said a statewide mask mandate was not necessary.
In July, Murphy reiterated the stance, saying he did “not want to go backward” to requiring masks and that it would take a “wholesale deterioration in health data” for him to change his mind.
“I don’t want to go backward — that’s the last thing I want to do — but we’ll do what we have to do,” he said on July 22.
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Murphy has also consistently pushed for New Jersey residents to receive a COVID-19 vaccination and called critics of the vaccine “ultimate knuckleheads.”
“These folks back there have lost their minds — you’ve lost your minds,” Murphy said about anti-vaccine protesters. “You are the ultimate knuckleheads, and because of what you are saying and standing for, people are losing their life. People are losing their life, and you have to know that. Look in the mirror.”
