Glenn Youngkin, Virginia’s new governor-elect plans to end the state-level mask mandate, but will not impose a mandate ban on localities:
After his inaugural ceremony on Jan. 15, Youngkin said he will not mandate masks and vaccines but–unlike some Republican governors–he will not attempt to block localities from implementing their own requirements.
“Localities are going to have to make decisions the way the law works and that is going to be up to individual decisions but, again, from the governor’s office, you won’t see mandates from me,” Youngkin clarified in a one-on-one interview over the weekend.
However, Youngkin has also promised to end the teaching of Critical Race Theory throughout Virginia’s public schools.
Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin said Saturday that if he is elected the commonwealth’s next governor he will “ban” the teaching of critical race theory on his first day in office.
In other words, he’s not leaving it up to localities.
Which raises a big question: Why trust local governments to make the right decisions on masks, but not the curriculum?
The obvious rationale for the CRT ban is that you don’t trust local governments to make the right choice because they’re somehow dominated by left-wing ideologues. Either local leaders are themselves ideologues, or they’re so beholden to teachers’ unions that they might as well be.
But if that’s what you think, why on Earth would you trust localities to make the right choice on masks? If local leaders are left-wing ideologues, or so beholden to teachers’ unions that they might as well be, then localities will mandate masks almost regardless of the objective risks.
The cynical explanation is that Virginia voters clearly oppose CRT in schools, but not masks in schools. Which also fits with Youngkin’s support for long-standing vaccine mandates, but not a Covid vaccine mandate…
READER COMMENTS
Jon Murphy
Dec 21 2021 at 10:02am
Could it be that Youngkin doesn’t want to overpromise and underdeliver, and thus is making a statement about what he can and cannot do?
In other words, does the governor have more power over commonwealth-wide school curricula then he does over countries and their legislation?
Andrew_FL
Dec 21 2021 at 11:01am
Virginia is a state with no home rule, so Youngkin says he won’t ban local mask mandates because he doesn’t need to, localities can’t mandate masks in Virginia in the first place.
Jon Murphy
Dec 21 2021 at 11:17am
That’ll come to a surprise to Fairfax and the other counties/cities with mask mandates.
steve
Dec 21 2021 at 4:01pm
I doubt very much that Youngkin actually believes in the principle of having local areas make their rules. He is just optimizing his support for the next election.
Steve
Jose Pablo
Dec 21 2021 at 4:15pm
Exactly like all of us (or any rational person) would be doing in his position.
robc
Dec 21 2021 at 10:18pm
Cincinnatus would disagree.
Brandon Berg
Dec 21 2021 at 10:08am
If CRT is wrong (or right) verywhere, but the importance of using masks depends on local conditions, then it could make sense to set the former as a statewide policy and leave the latter up to localities.
J Mann
Dec 21 2021 at 10:47am
Some possibilities:
Youngkin is less confident that he’s correct about masks vs CRT.
He thinks the costs of masking are less than the costs of CRT.
He thinks the local governments deciding CRT (school boards) have been captured by the local left to a greater degree than the government making mask decisions (cities and counties.) In other words, cities and counties have some constraints – they are dependent on tax revenue, their Chambers of Commerce are a well organized constituency.
Related to 3, school board voters may not have accurate information about the amount of CRT taught is schools, especially voters who don’t have kids in the public schools, but city and county voters have very accurate information about masks, and are likely to vote if they are mad that there is or isn’t a mask mandate.
J Mann
Dec 21 2021 at 10:47am
Sorry, the comment system stripped my numbering again.
MikeP
Dec 21 2021 at 12:40pm
Youngkin is less confident that he’s correct about masks vs CRT.
This.
And note that Youngkin is a politician. If Trump taught us anything, it’s that a politician’s position is not about his confidence but about his supporters’ confidence, whether that confidence be rational or irrational.
Given the complete dearth of proof that masks work and the complete suppression of proof that masks don’t work, I doubt that most conservatives have any clue whether they work or not. So why make enemies by disallowing local control on that unknown.
Emily
Dec 21 2021 at 10:54am
Parents can tell if their kids are wearing masks and so they can at least theoretically raise their objections to it. No one is arguing over what a mask is and disputing that kids are being made to wear them. One of the arguments about what kids are being taught in schools is that parents don’t necessarily find out until later, and that you need to be paying a lot of attention to even know what’s going on.
Anyway, these seem like different issues along multiple dimensions. (Also, I don’t think it’s cynical to say that one of these is more popular than another. That seems like an entirely-reasonable thing for a politician to care about.)
I’d add, “trusting local government to do the right thing” is not how I’d frame this or really any issue. It’s more, “do I think that local governments are the right institution to be making this decision?” I can think they are, even if I think they’ll make the wrong decision.
Jose Pablo
Dec 21 2021 at 2:17pm
Maybe the Governor thinks that mask mandates should depend on “Covid 19 local conditions” but there are no “local conditions” affecting the appropriateness of teaching CRT.
After all, maybe its fine that local governments rule on trash collection but not determine defense policies.
Patrick Tehan
Dec 21 2021 at 3:57pm
Lots of state funding of education unfortunately so they want to have a say. Masking doesn’t have that issue.
Lawrence
Dec 21 2021 at 4:47pm
Is it cynical for a leader looking to be democratically elected to promise to enact the policies favoured by voters? Isn’t that just straightforwardly the way democracy is supposed to work?
This seems to me to be similar to attacks on markets along the lines of ‘Amazon doesn’t really care about your customer experience, it just wants to maximize its profits’.
Jose Pablo
Dec 21 2021 at 6:29pm
That’s absolutely right: leaders try to get reelected, they should, and we know it.
The main difference with markets (with Amazon) is:
(a) we are leaders’ clients only once every four years. The rest of the time they are more kind of our “bosses” and can even steal a significant part of our salaries.
(b) we have a very limited and disappointing range of options as far as leaders are concern (not the case with Amazon)
(c) we don’t have the leader of our choice. Other people choices determine “my” leader.
(d) we are reasonably certain about what are we going to get from Amazon. With “leaders” we are buying the services of an agent “whom (we) cannot bind in matters of specific compliance, and to whom (we are) forced to grant wide latitude in the use of discretionary judgment. Politicians are simply not held liable for their promises and pledges in the same manner that private sellers are” to quote Buchanan on this topic.
Jose Pablo
Dec 21 2021 at 6:36pm
“Which also fits with Youngkin’s support for long-standing vaccine mandates, but not a Covid vaccine mandate…”.
This contradiction seems to be strangely prevalent. Nobody made a fuss when I was forced to get a bunch of vaccines if I wanted to attend college. And nobody is making a fuss of the bunch of vaccines that, for example, green card applicants are forced to get (but not if you are applying for a non-resident visa. That should be because, obviously, you are not “epidemically risky” if you are going to stay in the States for only 5 years)
Ryan M
Dec 22 2021 at 1:37pm
You are missing two points. First, these vaccines are not like those other vaccines. Use of the same term is misleading. Regardless, there has always been exceptions allowed, even going to college. If you objected, that would be ok.
But second, if people started talking about requiring proof of vaccination (tdap or rabies or flu) to fly, to eat at restaurants, to shop… You can bet there would be a lot of very strong objection.
These things are not equal, any more than forcing kids to wear masks all day in classrooms is equal to requiring seatbelts and booster seats. Those comparisons are disingenuous.
Jose Pablo
Dec 22 2021 at 5:49pm
So, according to your rational, at least as far as the second point is concern, it is ok to mandate covid vaccines to attend college or school. Or to perform any other activity that now requires mandatory vaccines.
So, the “problem” (again, trying to follow your rational here) is not with the “mandate per se” is with the “list of activities” that require a mandate:
Mandates are ok to attend college, attend school, green card petitioners, international travelers, health care personnel (“Healthcare personnel without evidence of immunity should get two doses of MMR vaccine, separated by at least 28 days”), women of childbearing age …
But they are not ok for other activities like travelling or shopping.
But I have to assume that this list of activities (for which mandates are acceptable), is not written on stone and could be changed based on a risk analysis perform by an independent authority depending on the specific transmission risk of the virus under consideration.
This is how we came up with the “list of activities for which mandates are acceptable”. So, I guess, accepting the “already acceptable” implies (it should) accepting the “methodology” that made mandates acceptable for these activities in the first place.
You are walking a tightrope here.
And you believe that all of the “differences in fuss” with the vaccines mandates that I was mentioning, is related with the different in the scope of activities subjected to a mandate and has nothing to do with irrational political stances.
And I am the disingenuous …
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
Dec 24 2021 at 6:42pm
What is the difference in the vaccine for COVIS and any other? They reduce the probability that the vaccinated person will acquire the disease and pass it on. Proof of measles vaccination to enter a restaurant or place of employment would not be cost effective becasue almost everyone has already been vaccinated or had the disease which confers lifetime immunity. When Covid vaccinations/earlier infections reach that stage, proof of vaccination will not be cost effective, either.
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
Dec 24 2021 at 6:34pm
I don’t see the difference. The risk that a person will bring a pathogen into a country or once there acquire and pass a pathogen on seems the same regardless of the kind of visa. Five years is plenty of time to become a vector.
Justin Merritt
Dec 22 2021 at 12:04pm
It seems like what you’re describing is a democratic system more-or-less delivering what the electorate wants within the bounds of federalism. Yes, it’s an unconscionable infringement on freedom, but it sounds like it’s working as the system was designed.
Ryan M
Dec 22 2021 at 1:32pm
Or constitution is designed to protect individual rights at all levels. Federalism does not mean that tyranny at the local level is acceptable. I think this is a concept that is often greatly misunderstood. It means, ultimately, that states cannot gather a majority to remove the rights of the minority. But that same concept applies at the local level as well. States, counties, cities, neighborhoods- regardless of how local you get, it is still unacceptable to vote as a majority to remove the rights of the minority.
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
Dec 24 2021 at 6:47pm
But a majority does have the right to restrict the rights of a minority to infect them with a serious disease. That’s what a vaccine mandate is doing: reducing the probability of a person acquiring a disease and passing it on to others.
Ryan M
Dec 22 2021 at 1:25pm
Agreed. I have often pointed out that the localization of bad ideas and government overreach does not cure their problems.
I will take maybe an unpopular position by drawing the line in this way. Our constitution “limits” government authority (naturally, because it is premised on the assumption that government has no authority not explicitly granted; but also further limited in the bill of rights). I have no problem with state and even federal governments limiting local authorities by declaring that they are not permitted to restrict liberty. I do have a problem with State and federal governments making laws that apply to everyone and limiting local authorities by declaring that they are not permitted to expand liberty.
Thomas Lee Hutcheson
Dec 24 2021 at 6:29pm
I’m not in favor of either ban, but will point out that conditions for the spread of COVID and cost and benefits of preventing the spread may vary more from time to time and place to place than conditions for the “spread” of CRT. 🙂
TGGP
Dec 27 2021 at 12:54pm
Doesn’t the state of Virginia have a Department of Education, and doesn’t this provide a great deal of funding to local schools? I would expect Youngkin thinks that’s more his business, while managing whether mayors issue mandates is not.
J. Goard
Jan 1 2022 at 9:46am
“Which raises a big question: Why trust local governments to make the right decisions on masks, but not the curriculum?”
Because CRT is location-independent, but disease risk varies substantially with population density, and it’s useful for responses to outbreaks to be sensitive on a time scale of days?
Comments are closed.