Vice President Mike Pence has been touring around with Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos in recent weeks in the hopes of promoting the Trump administration’s rush to reopen the country, using children and teachers as the guinea pigs for this process. On Wednesday, the two traveled for a set of photo ops in North Carolina, where they visited Thales Academy in Apex.
According to the New Observer, the two wore masks as they exited their plane, and they wore masks as they entered the private school. However, once inside, both DeVos and Pence decided the best health practice was to expose an entire fourth grade class to their terrible breath and potentially virus-infected faces and mouths. They took their masks off to tell the children how excited they were to blah blah blah and … take some photos.
Unlike most schools in the country, Thales Academy reopened in July for in-person classes, and Pence and DeVos hope to push both the privatization of our public education system and prove it’s A-OK to ignore the current public health crisis. So this was a match made in whatever it is Pence considers heaven. Considering that day after day reveals positive COVID-19 tests for people who have come into close contact with the administration, the students at this elementary school—who, along with their teacher, were wearing masks—probably should be tested for the virus after this photo op.
DeVos, who is particularly uninspiring and scientifically deficient of mind, has previously offered up “good hygiene” as the solution to our country’s pandemic, all in order to justify the premature reopening of U.S. schools.
Again, the teacher in the classroom wore a mask, as did the students. It was only the two religious zealots with fancy titles who decided to take everyone else’s lives and well-being into their own hands.