Rachel Maddow Calls Out ‘Unnerving’ Lack of Masks, Social Distancing at Pence’s RNC Speech: Like We’re Watching ‘Chronicle of a Death Foretold’
MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow called out the “unnerving” lack of mask wearing and social distancing in the audience of Vice President Mike Pence’s outdoor acceptance speech on the third night of the Republican National Convention.
In her network’s post-convention coverage, the liberal primetime host focused in on the conspicuous absence of public health best practices at Pence’s address — the only live speech of the night — where nearly a thousand people sat in an audience at historic Ft. McHenry with chairs spaced a few feet apart. At one point during his aggressively anti-Democrat speech, Pence mentioned that his 87-year-old mother, Nancy, was in attendance, and the camera then showed her sitting amongst the crowd, none of whom were wearing masks.
“I have to say this felt like a long night from the Republican National Convention in part because a lot of the speeches are fairly long including Mike Pence’s, and while that wouldn’t usually matter to me that much, they did go out of their way to showcase the fact that this is an event with an audience,” Maddow noted. “Our reporting suggests there was not universal testing of everybody invited to this event. And to have so many elderly veterans or otherwise elderly people in this audience not sitting socially distanced, the vast majority of them not wearing any masks for this to go on for a very long time, including a lot of chanting and shouting, I just — I feel concerned for what is happening here especially after what happened at the Tulsa rally and other Trump events when they have gone out of their way to try to portray, show a visual image of a world and a country that’s gotten past the Covid threat when we really haven’t.”
On the third day of the RNC, the nation’s death toll from the coronavirus crossed another grim milestone — 180,000 dead — and it saw another 1,200 deaths, the highest daily fatality toll in more than a week. One of those victims was 74-year-old former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain, who died of complications from Covid-19 at the end of July, roughly six weeks after attending President Donald Trump’s campaign rally in Tulsa. Cain was photographed at the rally, which was indoors, without a mask and sitting in close proximity to others. He was admitted to the hospital 10 days later suffering from coronavirus symptoms.
“I know politically why they want to do that, but this is potentially a dangerous situation even in an outdoor setting for all of these elderly veterans tonight,” Maddow warned. “It is also particularly striking against the backdrop of Mike Pence, who led the coronavirus task force, maybe still does if it still exists, talking about how an untold number of American lives were saved by President Trump’s actions.”
“Well, there’s over 180,000 Americans dead,” Maddow continued. “Maybe you feel good about that number, maybe you feel like that’s success but over 180,000 American families have been destroyed by the loss of a loved one, and all they’re talking about with Covid is how it’s over and how they did great, and by the way implicitly, there is no reason for anybody here to be distanced or wearing a mask or to have been tested.
The MSNBC host then noted the coincidental timing of this speech happening on the same day as news reports about scaled-back CDC guidelines about who should get tested for Covid-19 — which were reportedly approved while Dr. Anthony Fauci was under general anesthesia for surgery.
“It’s unnerving at a health level,” Maddow said, summing up. “It feels like we’re watching Chronicles of a Death Foretold here.”
Watch the video above, via MSNBC.
