The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, suggested Thursday that a court did not have the authority to strike down the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) mask mandate.
U.S. District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle on Monday ruled that the face mask mandate for travelers, which had been extended from April 18 to May 3 by the Transportation Security Agency (TSA) earlier this month, was unlawful.
In her ruling, Judge Mizelle determined that the mandate “exceeded the CDC’s statutory authority, improperly invoked the good cause exception to notice and comment rulemaking, and failed to adequately explain its decisions.”
The TSA said it had extended the public transport mask mandate at the recommendation of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and against a background of increasing COVID cases across the country.
Following the ruling, several airlines immediately dropped their mask mandates.
“I was both surprised and disappointed,” Fauci said of the court ruling, “because those types of things really are the purview of the CDC. This is a public health issue.”
“If you look at the rationale for that, it really is not particularly firm, and we are concerned about that, about courts getting involved in things that are unequivocally a public health decision,” Fauci continued during a CNN+ interview. “This is a CDC issue, should not have been a court issue.”
Dr. Fauci to CNN+ on Judge Mizelle striking down the CDC’s mask mandate: “We are concerned about that about the courts getting involved in things that are unequivocally a public health decision…This is a CDC issue, should not have been a court issue…It was perfectly logical.” pic.twitter.com/hn19pAV2Vw
— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) April 21, 2022
Fauci insisted that the CDC’s May 3 end to the mask date should have been honored.
“So, we are hoping that the inevitable increase in cases which we are seeing are not going to be associated with an increase in hospitalizations,” he said. “So, all of these dynamic things going on at the same time, it was perfectly logical for the CDC to say wait a minute, we were planning on ending this mandate on a certain date, let’s wait a period of time until May 3, which was a very sound public health decision.”
Fauci’s remarks outraged some social media users.
“Is there a time, any time, regarding any power, that it IS appropriate for the checks and balances system we have to check the CDC’s ‘sound public-health decisions,’ according to Fauci,” asked commentator Mary Katherine Ham. “He seems to indicate no. But his personal judgment is not a workable limiting principle.”
Is there a time, any time, regarding any power, that it IS appropriate for the checks and balances system we have to check the CDC’s “sound public-health decisions,” according to Fauci? He seems to indicate no. But his personal judgment is not a workable limiting principle. https://t.co/8eQXlcD2IU
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) April 21, 2022
“Dr. Fauci really shouldn’t be commenting on issues that are unequivocally statutory authority issues,” tweeted communications consultant Matt Whitlock.
Dr. Fauci really shouldn’t be commenting on issues that are unequivocally statutory authority issues. https://t.co/PlLpBYel7E
— Matt Whitlock (@mattdizwhitlock) April 21, 2022
Fauci also sparked some backlash last week when he said that governments use lockdowns to “get people vaccinated” as he discussed China’s heavily restrictive coronavirus lockdowns.
Fauci said China has a “number of problems,” noting that the country’s strict lockdowns would never be able to be implemented in the United States, “although that prevents the spread of infection.”
“I remember early on they were saying, and I think accurately, that they were doing better than almost anyone else,” Fauci said.
“But lockdown has its consequences,” he continued. “You use lockdowns to get people vaccinated so that when you open up, you won’t have a surge of infections, because you are dealing with an immunologically naïve population, to the virus, because they’ve not really been exposed because of the lockdown.”
By: Eric Thompson, editor of EricThompsonShow.com. Follow me on Twitter and MagaBook
This story syndicated with permission from Eric Thompson, Author at Trending Politics
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