13 Aug RELEASE: Aligned Under the Banner of Hate: Republican Supermajority SLCo Council Bans Masks in Schools
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE |
Contact: Joshua Rush, Communications Director |
| Phone: +1 (801) 830-0645 | |
| Email: press@utdem.org | |
ALIGNED UNDER THE BANNER OF HATE: REPUBLICAN SUPERMAJORITY SLCo COUNCIL BANS MASKS IN SCHOOLS
SALT LAKE CITY, August 13th 2021 — In a humiliating move for Salt Lake County and the state of Utah, yesterday the County Council voted on party lines to overturn a mask mandate for K-6 students issued by county health director Dr. Angela Dunn. In doing so, they decided how history will remember them and their alignments.
United under not our nation’s flag but that of the Three Percenters, a dangerous far-right militia that showed up to support the Salt Lake County Republicans in their vote, Councilmembers Steve DeBry, Aimee Winder Newton, Richard Snelgrove, Laurie Stringham, Dea Theodore and David Alvord voted to repeal a mask mandate for children under 12 in Salt Lake County Schools.
“The Republicans on the County Council pose a clear danger to our children. By banning the mask mandate, they have chosen to put politics over the health and safety of kids in Utah schools, thusly endangering high-risk family members and condemning some Utah students to unknown long-term symptoms.” said Utah Democratic Party Chair Jeff Merchant “With a spouse in education and children of my own in Salt Lake County schools, I am reasonably concerned about my kids — and every resident of our county and our state should feel similarly fearful about what the Republicans’ reckless actions today will result in to our case numbers tomorrow.”
Utah Democrats are committed: to science, which holds that mask mandates will protect our children and most vulnerable; to freedom, especially the freedom to not be infected with a potentially deadly virus; and to neighborly love, because when we finally beat COVID-19, we know it will be because we all banded together to defeat it united.
The Utah Democratic Party is the face and voice of Democrats in the State of Utah. We believe that Utahns deserve strong, competent leadership that puts the people and democracy first.
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