Vice President Harris and President Biden at the White House.EVAN VUCCI/ASSOCIATED PRESS
President Joe Biden has hailed a “great day for America” as US officials said vaccinated people can go mask-less in most indoor and outdoor settings.
The president removed his mask in the Oval Office with Republican lawmakers as the guidance was being announced.
The advice still calls for wearing masks in crowded indoor settings like buses, planes and hospitals.
The Biden administration has faced pressure to ease restrictions on fully vaccinated people.
In another major step for the US in returning to pre-pandemic life, the president of the 1.7m-member American Federation of Teachers labour union called for schools to reopen fully in the autumn.
AFT President Randi Weingarten demands fully in-person learning at all US schools
On Thursday morning, American Federation of Teachers (AFT) President Randi Weingarten gave a one-hour speech that centered on demanding the full reopening of all US schools this fall and promoting illusions in the Biden administration’s federal stimulus programs.
The speech underscored the corporatist character of the trade union bureaucracies, which Biden and the Democrats are integrating ever more closely with the state in order to suppress the class struggle. Weingarten, who sits on the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and nets an executive salary of roughly $500,000, embodies the upper middle class layer of union bureaucrats that are thoroughly hostile to the interests of the workers they claim to represent.
Centers for Diseases Control (CDC) Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky has “recommended” that children wear masks while playing. Her offered reason is to ensure Covid is not spread by “heavy breathing” of children near each other while around a soccer ball.
Dr. Walensky’s recommendation is one more example of Covid authoritarians refusal to “listen to the science.” The science says no to lockdowns and masks. The masks are not blocking the very small viruses in “heavy breathing.” Dr. Walensky also ignores the science showing that wearing a mask while exercising or playing sports has negative health effects.
Dr. Walensky’s most outrageous disregard of science is