Maskless Ron DeSantis High-Fives Attendees at Packed Trump Rally, Rubs His Nose With Hand

A maskless Governor Ron DeSantis was seen on video high-fiving numerous MAGA supporters along a rope line at President Donald Trump’s rally in Sanford, Florida — and seconds later, he conspicuously rubbed his nose.

DeSantis was attending the president’s Monday night rally, the first in-person event that Trump is holding since he was diagnosed and hospitalized for the coronavirus 10 days earlier. In news footage of the event — as with most Trump rallies — there was very little mask wearing and effectively zero social distancing. DeSantis’ decision to make physical hand-to-hand contact with several rallygoers, as well as immediately touching his face following the behavior, violated numerous CDC guidelines.

DeSantis has arrived maskless at Superspreader event giving high fives before ending with nose rub-pick pic.twitter.com/g6Qnk3zG6o

— Daniel Uhlfelder (@DWUhlfelderLaw) October 12, 2020

DeSantis stands out as among the most vocal cheerleaders of Trump’s aggressive reopenign coronavirus approach and, last month, made the controversial move to effectively lift all pandemic lockdown restrictions just one day after his state recorded the highest daily death rate in the country.

Earlier in the summer, DeSantis had drawn mockery and backlash after Florida was rocked by a massive spike in Covid-19 cases and deaths in June and July, just weeks after he had blasted the press for purportedly ignoring the absence of an outbreak in his state leading up to the Memorial Day weekend.