Some Democratic governors are beginning to break with the Biden administration’s approach to the pandemic, even as new COVID-19 variants heighten warnings from public health experts.
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis became the latest leader within his party to signal a departure from the wartime footing the Biden administration has maintained heading into the third year of the pandemic.
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Polis said Friday that “the emergency is over,” and public health officials should no longer “tell people what to wear,” referring to mask mandates. He noted that people who want to get vaccinated have had ample opportunity to do so, and those who fall severely ill after refusing the shot have themselves to blame.
It was a different tone than the one President Joe Biden has struck on the urgency and danger presented by the pandemic, which Biden and his top aides have argued still requires burdensome mandates and extended restrictions. They have suggested that people can’t be trusted to make their own decisions about whether to get inoculated against COVID-19, pushing vaccine requirements that court after court has stopped over constitutional concerns.
But Polis joined a growing number of his colleagues who have moved away from the crisis-management approach to COVID-19, recognizing the need to start articulating what a return to normal could look like.
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer weathered protests and aggressive criticism from the Right over her strict lockdowns in the early months of the pandemic when she imposed a stay-at-home order and temporarily shuttered most businesses.
Whitmer at the time was aligned with most blue-state Democrats, who similarly followed the strictest line of advice from public health officials and generally kept restrictions going longer than red-state Republicans.
Whitmer broke with the Biden administration last week, however, when she described his vaccine mandate as a “problem.”
“We’re an employer too, the state of Michigan is,” Whitmer said. “I know if that mandate happens, we’re going to lose state employees. That’s why I haven’t proposed a mandate at the state level.”
Whitmer echoed the concerns of those critical of Biden’s vaccine mandates, who have warned that requiring companies to condition employment on vaccines could cause disruptions to business. Some federal judges have agreed with that argument on a number of Biden administration pandemic policies, including vaccine mandates.
Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly has also criticized vaccine mandates and signed legislation in late November, against the wishes of some of her state’s Democrats, that created permissive exemptions for vaccine requirements.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said last month in response to questions about the pandemic response that people should “just get vaccinated” and that he has no plans to implement emergency measures at this stage in the pandemic.
“The tools are different now,” Walz said of how the widespread availability of vaccines has changed how he thinks political leaders should respond to the virus. Walz said scientific data no longer supports the need for policies such as lockdowns and mandates to contain the spread of the virus — even as Minnesota’s case count has climbed.
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Centrist congressional Democrats have also begun to express doubts about the Biden administration’s heavy-handed approach to pandemic policy as vaccines and emerging treatment options have dramatically lessened the dangers of the virus for most people.
Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin and Jon Tester voted last week with Republicans to block Biden’s federal vaccine mandate for private employers amid concerns over whether the government should be forcing people to take the vaccine.
Although the vote was largely symbolic given the unlikelihood of it passing the Democratic-controlled House, it exposed the shrinking support Biden has on Capitol Hill and beyond for his COVID-19 strategy.
