Jake Tapper Calls Out Mark Meadows, White House on Mask-Wearing: ‘It’s Not Virtue-Signaling… This Is About Health!’

White House chief of staff Mark Meadows refused to talk to reporters Monday with his mask on, and CNN’s Jake Tapper called him out for it hours later.

Tapper noted how previous Trump rallies have not featured much social distancing and that many people have chosen not to wear masks.

The Daily Beast’s Jackie Kucinich noted how the White House pushback to masks comes from the top down, and remarked on new reporting that closer advisers don’t feel like they can wear masks in the White House “because the president really looks down upon it and it’s this kind of — I guess the opposite of virtue signaling.”

Tapper more specifically called out Meadows over an exchange in which the White House chief of staff declined to wear a mask while talking to reporters. The CNN anchor noted that Meadows has said he’s tested negative, but “he was with the president at the hospital, inside the Oval Office with him inside that 10-day period.”

“He literally has been with an infected…” Tapper started. “You know, according to his own words, a deathly ill president in the last week.”

“All I can do is shake my head at this,” CNN’s Nia-Malika Henderson said. “This idea that he just can’t bother to speak through a mask, I mean, it’s ridiculous. Again, I think Jackie is exactly right. This is all about loyalty to the president. Are you with him or against him?”

“It’s not virtue signaling,” Tapper added. “In Arkansas, they have a mask mandate. This isn’t about liberals, this is about health!”

You can watch above, via CNN.