President unmasked: Trump goes maskless AGAIN on tour of factory despite being surrounded by staff in face coverings
PRESIDENT Donald Trump has been seen not wearing a mask again on a tour of a factory despite being surrounded by staff in face coverings.
The president decided to go without PPE during his visit to Owens and Minor Inc. in Allentown, Pennsylvania, on Thursday.
Trump has resisted wearing a mask in public despite his administration’s guidance to Americans to wear them and new White House rules requiring staff to wear them at work.
The president toured the Owens & Minor Inc distribution center, which the White House said has sent millions of N95 masks, surgical gowns and gloves to hospitals and surgery centers across the United States. Company officials wore masks.
Trump visited a mask production facility in Arizona last week and also did not wear a face covering, though he said he tried some on backstage.
Earlier this month, it was reported that the president thinks that wearing a mask would send the wrong message before the election.
Trump told advisers that he believes wearing a mask would “send the wrong message,” one administration and two campaign officials told the Associated Press.
The president said that wearing a mask would make it seem like he is preoccupied with health instead of focused on reopening the nation’s economy — which his aides believe is the key to his reelection chances in November, according to the report.
However, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi suggested the president refuses to wear PPE because he dislikes the way it looks.
“The President, it’s a vanity thing, I guess, with him,” Pelosi said during an interview with MSNBC.
“I don’t know why he would be vain, but anyways, it’s a vanity thing.
“You would think as the President of the United States you would have the confidence to honor the guidance that you are giving others in the country.”
On Monday, the president said that he required everyone in the White House to wear a face mask — despite not wearing one himself.
When asked by a reporter if he required that everyone who enters the White House wears a face mask, Trump replied “I required it.”
The president said that executives, staffers and representatives have been wearing masks.
During the press conference, Trump was one of the only people in the Rose Garden without a mouth covering.
Last week, the coronavirus began to break out in the White House as two aides tested positive for the disease.
Source: Mollie Mansfield, thesun.co.uk/news/11626416/trump-maskless-factory-tour-pennsylvania/