WATCH: Trump Rallygoers Tell a CNN Reporter All the Reasons Why They Won’t Wear a Mask — Even After Trump Got Covid
CNN reporter Gary Tuchman interviewed a number of Trump supporters at a Florida rally and had them explain the different reasons why they refuse to wear a mask — even after the president was infected and hospitalized to treat his coronavirus diagnosis.
During Anderson Cooper‘s Monday night show, he aired a report from the packed and non-socially distanced campaign rally in Sanford, Florida, where Tuchman talked with a number of maskless Trump supporters about their very public choice not to follow CDC guidelines.
“If you thought that people would be more careful at rallies after hearing that Donald Trump had coronavirus and there was a super spreading event at the White House, you would be incorrect,” Tuchman said, leading off. “About 90% of people did not have masks. Every one had their temperatures checked and they were given hand sanitizer, and they were given masks and there were no mandate to wear them. Most of those masks were put in pockets and never came out again.”
Turning to one maskless woman Tuchman asked about the lack of concern for catching the coronavirus even as the president just demonstrated how easily it can be transmitted.
“I am healthy, I have no underlying health issues. That seems to be the people that are most prone to get the disease,” she said.
“Trump was healthy too, though, and he had to take a helicopter to the hospital,” Tuchman pointed out. He also noted that Trump had perhaps the best medical care in the world.
“Do you have care that good?”
“No, but I take care of myself,” she said.
Next, a man in a “Trump is my president” T-shirt tried to claim that a mask can do more harm than good. “People can faint because there is too much carbon dioxide going back in the system,” the mad then insisted, which has been debunked as a highly exaggerated claim.
When Tuchman pushed back, noting the lack of a nationwide fainting outbreak, the man replied: “Enough people are getting ill because they are wearing a mask.
“Where does that [claim] come from?” Tuchman pressed.
“Common sense,” was the man’s response.
An elderly woman in a sun visor then ran through a number of excuses for not donning a mask, variously claiming she wouldn’t get Covid, even if she did she wouldn’t die from it, and even if she died from it, it was God’s will.
Finally, Tuchman interviewed a pair of women.
“Let me ask you this, if President Trump at the rally said ‘Everyone put on their mask…'”
“I would put it on,” one of the women said, before Tuchman could even finish his question. But the CNN reporter then pointed out that Trump gave no such command on Monday night. In fact, in his first in-person event outside of the White House since contracting Covid-19, Trump went on a bizarre riff on his supposed temporary immunity, boasting that he could run into the crowd and “kiss everyone” without endangering his own life.
