President Joe Biden once promised that he wouldn’t shut down the country but that he would “shut down the virus.” He hasn’t really lived up to that promise, and it isn’t clear that he even wants to.
Biden is now dragging the country backward, as his administration is now recommending masks go back on for the fully vaccinated. This comes as COVID-19 cases surge, thanks to the delta variant, yet deaths remain steadily low thanks to a combination of vaccinations, natural immunity, and improved techniques for managing symptoms in acute cases.
Biden intends to keep the country under the yoke of pandemic restrictions at least through the rest of this year. There is no other excuse for the administration to recommend that K-12 students be forced to wear masks in school, given that the risk COVID-19 poses to children is lower than that of any given strain of the flu. The recommendation even applies to children over the age of 12 who have been vaccinated.
More news: The CDC will also announce today that they are recommending everyone in K-12 schools wear a mask, regardless of vaccination status, a health official tells me.
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) July 27, 2021
Biden simply does not want the pandemic restrictions to end. And why would he? COVID made him president. It is, essentially, all he ran his campaign on.
Biden’s signature policy achievement so far has been a boondoggle stimulus bill thinly disguised as a coronavirus relief bill. He’s built up goodwill with the public by simply acting like he’s treating the pandemic seriously, boasting a 63% approval rating on his handling of it, according to an ABC News/Ipsos poll.
That number is Biden’s lifeline, and it has dropped 9 points since March. The rest of his poll numbers are floundering: His handling of the economy is down 7 points to 53%, while he’s underwater on crime (39%), immigration (37%), and gun violence (37%).
Most notably, 55% of adults are pessimistic about the direction of the country, a full 19-point drop in optimism from this April. Pessimism is up “across all age groups, income levels, educational attainment, and partisan affiliation.”
That’s why Biden can’t actually afford to put the pandemic behind him. At this early point in his presidency, it is all that is propping him up, given that grand Democratic promises of change are mostly stymied by a 50-50 Senate. It’s not even clear that he can oversee the passage of an infrastructure bill, bipartisan or not. Biden has nothing else on his agenda if he decides it’s time to move on from the pandemic.
COVID-19 is no longer a public health emergency. It’s just part of life. For children and for adults who have taken the sensible step of getting vaccinated, it is a manageable reality with low risk or complications. And although we don’t know how long natural immunity lasts, those who have previously contracted the virus also remain at low risk.
Meanwhile, the vaccine is readily available for anyone over the age of 12 who wants it. Mask mandates are no longer necessary, but Biden needs the hysteria over the delta variant to keep going. Otherwise, he might actually have to wrestle with real issues, such as homicides or the crisis at the southern border. This will remain the case until his approval numbers are no longer salvageable. Until then, he wants the masks to go back on.
