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accessories. something for every c-span fan. every purchase helps support our nonprofit operation. shop now or any time at c-spanshop.org. a very good tuesday morning with you you can go ahead and start calling and now. this is the story from npr. the oregon said state that --set to lift mass mandates. the story noting some of the timelines. they are ending the mask mandates on february 28 and on march seventh statewide mask mandates will be lifted in new jersey, and oregon and delaware those are said to be lifted on march 30 first. those are the timelines. basically we will set with new

jersey. the governor at a press conference yesterday. >> we would not be doing this if we did not recommend we could lifted but you have to know your own health situation. if you have a comorbidity or a district thinks there is an outbreak in that community all other things being equal, a healthy child going to school they can go without a mask on march seventh. you have to reserve the right to the district, a district reserves the right to keep something in place. and secondly, individual based on their own right reserves that right and we cannot stigmatize a decision like that. we are trying to get, given all the unpopular decisions,

politician -- politics was on the front burner. you are trying to get a whole bunch of data strings together and make the best call you can and so it is a combination of cases, hospitalizations, positivity rates of transmission all going dramatically in the right direction. it is trying to project out what those data streams look like weeks ahead of time. it is acknowledging that vaccination rates continue to creep up among kids who are more recently eligible, not as fast as we like but slowly and surely. the committee is likely to approve vaccines for kids under five years old. that combination has given us the sense that plus or minus a

month from now is the right time to do it. we are dealing with a pandemic, it's like dealing with mother nature you are due the best you can. this feels right to us. host: governor phil murphy at that press conference. you can watch the rest of that briefing at our website at c-span.org. this map at state policy, showing the 16 states that have statewide school mask mandates. that has now dropped to 12 in march due to that announcement. delaware, new jersey, and oregon. we are taking your phone calls we want to hear your thoughts. whether you support them, (202)

748-8000 if you oppose (202) 748-8001 and if you are in new jersey, oregon or delaware (202) 748-8003. it was jen psaki who was asked about that new jersey move, here is her response. >> that still remains our recommendation. >> are you fine with the new jersey's recommendation? quek it continues to be that the cdc is advising that masks can delay, reduce transmission. there are also a lot of mitigation measure but that continues to be cdc guidance. it has always been up to local school districts. >> what does this say that it

could be ahead of the cdc recommendation? >> it is always been up to the school district and our policy is to advise everyone to abide by public guidelines. >> do you thinks that it it is time for a change in the public policy? >> there has been a decrease in hospitalizations around the country and again, we are in constant touch about what it looks like moving forward. our responsibility as the federal government is to rely on the data and we will rely on that for the red -- recommendations we are making. host: we are getting your reaction this morning and for states, we specifically want to talk to residents of delaware,

new jersey, oregon. we will start out of north miami beach. caller: good morning c-span, good morning america. with these mask on, you are breathing carbon dioxide. with the wi-fi router it will be a pretext to quarantine them, force vaccinate them. kids have the best immune system. host: do you have kids? caller: i have three nieces and nephews. i don't want schools with wi-fi

routers with frequencies like they have been high-rises. host: we are talking about masking mandates. statewide school masking mandates is the conversation this morning. dana from michigan. caller: good morning. host: we are talking about the lifting of these school masking mandates in the schools that still have them. caller: i don't think we should encourage people not to wear masks. i think we should encourage everyone to get vaccinated. if you consider the possible

origins of the virus, dictators so to speak, this is their way of trying to get at us. we have to get it right. host: this is not trying to encourage people not to wear masks. in new jersey, school districts can still decide on masking on mandates in specific school districts and outbreaks or spreads. a connecticut it can be decided by school district. this happens to happen for every school in the state. they can make their own choices. caller: i agree with that, it is beyond that. i am ago above and beyond kind of person. everyone wear your mask.

use all the trouble that they had in texas when he said that. we have to keep our country strong. someone is responsible for unleashing this coronavirus on us in the first place. host: when you say to wear our mask how long do we do that? caller: this is a worldwide thing, this is a pandemic. we are not in a bubble here in the united states. we should just keep doing it until we are in the clear. i think it is going to be for two, three more years. our lives are at stake. consider the source from where the coronavirus initiated. host: from the governors themselves tweeting about these mask mandates and schools. from governor john carney, we

are lifting our mask mandates, the mask mandate included schools k-12. we are in a much better place than we were several weeks ago. his tweet yesterday morning. the governor from connecticut saying that we have made considerable progress and people from connecticut have many tools to keep them safe that is why as of february 28 mask mandates will be decided by the school districts and not the states. our commissioners at the public health department and education department discussed it at length and we arrived in the decision together. the governor of connect

--connecticut making his announcement at the same time as the governor of delaware and new jersey. these moves happening across the country and we are getting your reaction this morning. next from's bow can, washington. caller: i can't believe we ever put these kids in masks. masks are very ineffective in the spread of this disease. children were never at risk of dying at this disease unless they had underlying conditions. the whole thing was insane as far as i am concerned. host: do you have kids? caller: they are grown. the damage we have done to our

children keeping them out of school and then making them wear masks. it is insane. host: washington is one of those states that made that announcement, to connecticut. caller: i am not in favor of it. our positivity rate has gone down recently. it could go up in storage -- surge at any time. my niece passed away just on sunday of covid and she was 30 years old. she was vaccinated but she was around people who were not vaccinated and it is very sad and heartbreaking.

i have been trying since this whole thing started to get people where there masks and to get vaccinated and i think it is premature for the governor of connecticut and other states to lift the mandate. host: out of tennessee. good morning. caller: i don't support any mandates and schools. i live in a state that banned all mask mandates. i think it is completely political. we knew that they would in the mandate just in time for the elections to get rolled out because they are taking so much heat for enforcing these mandates. when was the last time you heard joe biden here wear our mask?

--where mask? we know it is political. we know what is going to happen. they put our kids in masks to beat donald trump. i watched msnbc this morning, oh what masks have done to our children. she hasn't been worried about it for two years. desantis have stopped their mandates and all they have caught is grief. but now, the democrats are not receiving the same bad press.

host: glenn youngkin made banning districts --banning mask mandates an issue. randi weingarten, she said that she wants guidelines from the cdc about when and how, she worries that policymakers could be changing the rules for the wrong reasons. >> we knew there needed to be in offramp for mask mandates but it has to be informed by metrics and science and not politics.

host: the viewer was asked by joe biden statements on this. he was asked in a recent interview what life looks like after covid and here is a bit of that exchange. >> based on your conversation with your health advisor, what kind of restrictions do you see on americans this time next year? biden: i hope the new normal will be that we still don't have masks 13 months after being vaccinated. i hope people have taken advantage of what we have available. with the pill that appears to be as efficacious as it seems to be

that we will be able to deal with this virus in a way that will have you will have the ability to not get very sick. number three, i would hope that the rest of the world does what i am doing and provide significant amount of the vaccine to the rest of the world because it is not efficient if we just have this country not have the virus or be under the control of the virus because we don't --we can't build a wall high enough to keep the virus out. we -- how do we move in a direction where the world itself is vaccinated? it is not enough just to vaccinate three hundred 40 million people in the united states. that is not enough. host: president biden talking

about what a new normal might look up --like. the timelines for the mask mandates in four states delaware, new jersey connecticut and oregon. cindy, good morning. caller: i do support a mask mandate. i think governor lamont has been pretty evenhanded but it is an election year for him. i believe someone that this is political. the cdc has been wrong on a lot of stuff. given the head of the cdc, i am not so sure.

host: what makes you think they are squashing studies? caller: i did see a report today about how they did kanas study in june of 2021 because they were not getting the results that they wanted to promote the mandate. there are a lot of countries that need to be way ahead of us on a lot of things. we are not doing a lot of randomized studies that we should be doing. lamont did that caveat for the school districts to decide ultimately. i don't know if the same thing that is happening here that they are in virginia. i don't know if the same result is going to happen here.

i do support it, it is bad for the kids. we have known it for a long time. i think it is a good thing. i just hope, i wish we would stop using each other's political foot walls. -- footballs. host: you brought up virginia, what is happening with the republican governor happening there. this is paul from virginia. caller: i would like to say that you took a lot of heat yesterday and you did a really good job. host: your thoughts on this mask mandate? caller: the thing in virginia is

, it is mainly the way of challenging governor youngkin's lifting of the mask mandate. it is d.c. beltway and the interesting thing that got me is when you show the map of the few states that have school mask mandates. it is amazing how when four democrat held areas are getting all this press coverage and praise for lifting the mandates when many of these states have been way ahead of this and have been following the science and not the political jargon from

the cdc and the white house. host: you think in the last 24 hours they have gotten of applause for this? caller: it's been all about them and how amazing it is, and it's about time. the media is saying it's about time that they did this in the great job that they are all doing for putting out this timeline. it is just amazing, with the midterms coming up that they have done this and started listening to the science. host: take a look at that map again it will pop up on your screen in a second. the states and purple are the states that have specific bands on mask mandates and some of those date back many months.

we have heard the ones in texas and florida. i wonder what your sense was of the coverage on those bands on schoolwide mask mandates? caller: on those statewide school mandates, though states and purple -- states in purple, i believe they should go back to letting the local school districts handle the local issues. that is what they have always said. i come from a family of educators, and to me, the federal government needs to let

the states handle their own educational system and return it back to the local localities. host: if alexandria are the inside the beltway and they want to have a mask mandate regardless of a vaccination status, would you be ok with that for arlington and alexandria is that what you're saying? caller: i believe it should be left to the local school boards. the local school boards are elected. i am down in tidewater and right now it is down to the schools. they are following the governor's decision.

i have two grandchildren, one in kindergarten and one of fifth-grade and they are doing just fine right now. it is really a good thing. now again, with the mask mandates, i think they are out of control and it is become too political. it is time the politics came out of it and let people make their own risk assessments. caller: this is a leo in illinois. host: my sister died from the covid virus. she was at a birthday party with my grandchild and she was there

just long enough to eat the cake . i was around a person here, i can't get vaccinated and neither could she. we can't get vaccinated because we have a medical condition where we can't. i was around the person where he had the virus and i did not know it and i was wearing and n95 mask. the masks do help. those kids in school, they don't wear the masks half the time.

their noses exposed, it is around their chin. you can't get the little kids to wear the masks right half of the time. but i do think that masks help. host: thank you for the call. this is earl from georgia. caller: good morning. i just want to make a comment. there is one thing i would like to say, people always complain about this and that. if people were to actually take the time and obey the laws we would be in better shape. i have three grandkids in atlanta, georgia, in school.

in my grandchild is on the honor roll and she always wears her mask. people want to put politics into stuff. if you are not the one to take power over your mind to do the right thing, we will be ok. what got us into the problem today. because we are blaming the leaders of the country. yes, i agree to it, this mask mandate, to a certain extent, until the number goes down, because i do not want my grandkids are going to school and get sick behind a child who cannot wear a mask. he cannot go to school coughing and stuff.

if a parent knows their child is coughing and lets the child go to school and get someone also, i will fight that parent for it. host: 7:30 on the east coast. in this first hour, talking about statewide school mask mandates. more states making announcements they will be sunsetting their statewide mask mandates, mostly blue states that still have the statewide mask mandates for schools. in connecticut, the governor ending the mandate in schools and childcare centers on february 28. in new jersey, it is effective march 7. in delaware and oregon, march 31. showing statements from governors on the east coast. from oregon governor -- oregon's

governor -- because of your actions, she says, oregon will lift mask requirements no later than march 31. that is the statewide requirement. many of these requirements, including the ones in new jersey and connecticut, allowing individual school systems to bring back mask mandates if they deem them necessary in response to surges, but we are talking about the statewide mask mandates. getting your reaction on full nights for, those who oppose, and a special line for residents of connecticut, delaware, oregon, and new jersey. caller: good morning. i work in an elementary cafeteria. i think it is so harmful for these children to have these masks on. they eat their lunch.

they do not wipe their faces. they put their masks back on. it is so harmful for these little children. working in an elementary building, people who think these children should keep their masks on, maybe they should experience being around little children with their masks on. one day, i heard this little girl upset because some little boy got near her. they are afraid to be near each other now. i am just so excited they will get rid of this mask mandate someday soon, i hope. it is really very harmful mentally and physically to these children. host: ask for the call. in new york, here is the latest, reporting from the wall street journal. a judge in long island temporarily suspended the state's mask mandate, saying legislators need approval from

-- saying there needs to be approval from the state legislator. -- legislature. the governor saying she hopes to get to a place where schools can lift mask mandates but she wants to see a higher rate of vaccination among elementary age children. that is the latest from there. back to the garden state, this is janine. good morning. caller: good morning. i definitely support dropping the mask mandate at school. i am a parent of a 4-year-old and 2-year-old. my four-year-old son does attend public school. it is heartbreaking, seeing all these young children walking around with a mask on their face all day long. they do not wear it properly. most of them are wearing a piece of cloth over their face, which does nothing to stop the virus. back when this started, coming out with covid, the government

said you must wear an n95 mask. those are the ones that will protect you. then they changed their mind and said just put a piece of cloth over their face, because people did not have access to an n95 mask. the government was just giving people a false sense of security. these children are getting scared of adults have a 2-year-old who has been born into this pandemic. that is only thing she knows, walking around, seeing adults with masks on their faces. children are developing more and more speech delayed. children are developing more and more upper respiratory infections because they are constantly breathing and the germs. it is not healthy. teachers took a job teaching knowing they will be around children with germs. germs are little german factories. the masks need to go. you cannot be hiding around a mask and give parents a salt -- parents a false sense of

security that your child is safe at school. schools have germs in them here that has been known ever since schools have started. children go to school, they get sick, spread germs -- host: do you mind if i ask? we, at some point, are expecting vaccines to be approved for the youngest kids, the 0 to 5 year olds. still waiting on the data, but it seems to be moving in that direction. your kids are in that age range. would you get your kids vaccinated when it becomes available? caller: absolutely not. i will not vaccinate myself. i do not believe in these vaccines that were pushed so rapidly. there was no long-term study done about this. everybody who says it is safe, they are lying to you. the government is trying to give you a false sense of security, pushing these vaccines. you cannot vaccinate yourself out of this pandemic.

the covid-19 is here to stay. thanks, china, for giving it to us. people need to understand this is going to be here. pharmaceutical companies want to keep a sick. they do not want to keep us healthy, or else they will not make money. host: one more question -- with your children, did you get them vaccinated for the other series of childhood vaccines, measles, mumps, rubella, all the other ones kids get in their first couple of years? caller: absolutely, because those are true vaccines. it is not a get vaccinated and then just get a mild case of it. that is nonsense. you really have to think about the pharmaceutical companies. they pushed this too soon. they say it is free -- it is not free. i absently get my children vaccinated. i am not an anti-vaxxer. i'm an anti-this-vaccine. what about that super spreading

aids prevalent in the netherlands? this is creating more and more health problems. you cannot just keep getting a booster shot and booster shot and thinking this will make you better. people at high risk, absolutely get it. it is a good step for you. people such as myself and my family, we do not need this vaccine. just keep washing your hands, practice good hygiene. if you have a little runny nose, stay home. stay away from other people. host: taking your phone calls. phone lines, if you support lifting statewide school mask mandates, (202) 748-8001. if you oppose, (202) 748-8000. a phone line for those books in specific states where this news was happening yesterday, new jersey, connecticut, delaware, and oregon. yesterday on this program, we were joined by an epidemiologist at johns hopkins university, and

we talked about masks for kids at schools. [video clip] >> i have two kids at school. my daughter is in kindergarten. she has been wearing a mask in a school setting for those three years now. i do not love it, but they are still wearing it. right now, i think it is offering some operational advantages in terms of our kid'' schools have not closed down in this recent wave of cases. i am grateful for that. i am also grateful that, when i hear of cases that the schools, i can take part of my worries because they are vaccinated and wearing a mask, i am able to brush it off, it is not a big deal. i think it is important to figure out when we can get masks off of our kids sooner rather than later. but i think it is not a simple fact passing absolutely, yes, now. we have to make sure teachers feel safe, that adults in the

school feel safe. one, because it is safe, but also it is pragmatic. the magic that happens in the classroom is because the teachers are there happily are not feeling like they are there under duress. it is really important for us to consider the factors, the feelings of multiple parties in the classroom. even though my risk tolerance for my kids may be higher than others' would be, i do not know if there are other kids in the classrooms who have medical vulnerabilities -- i think it is a little bit more of a complicated issue than the headlines portray. but i think we, as a society and as a community, need to define when to take off masks and do it sooner rather than later. host: jennifer nuzzo from johns hopkins university. that was yesterday on this program. if you want to watch that in its entirety, you can do so at our website, c-span.org.

back to your phone calls. vivian from pine bluff, arkansas, you are next. caller: good morning. i just wanted to make a couple of observations. i am in a state where we have, so far, identified almost 800,000 total cases with almost 1000 added just yesterday. we are just coming off of a second spike. people are still dying. we have had a total of almost 10,000 deaths in our state. people forget, when we shut down the schools, we did not know what the impact was on children in our state. thankfully, we have only had two

pediatric -- recorded pediatric covert tests. -- covid tests. but we still do not have total vaccine protection for our children. i think we are still suffering from misinformation and fear and politicize -- politicization from the last administration. individuals making statements about how horrible -- harmful the mask mandate is. this little thing called science says masks do help prevent the spread of the virus, period. we know that the vaccine is working. we have truth that people who are still contracting the virus, people who are still hospitalized by the virus, people who are still dying from

the virus, and, in some cases, more children than others, more than not, most of those people, over 90% of the people being affected are those not vaccinated. host: that is vivian in arkansas. you were talking about some of the numbers in your state. nationwide, we are at 9,300,864 deaths from the pandemic. there was a scene yesterday, a moment of silence for the 900,000 american lives lost to covid-19. speaker nancy pelosi standing there with other congressional lawmakers, holding that moment of silence. if you want to watch that, you can do so at our website, c-span.org. barry in williamsburg, virginia. you are next. caller: good morning.

i support the lifting of the mandates. i do not really support mandating. i believe, if you feel it is your life in danger, you should wear a mask. that should be your own common sense. the state may encourage you or the governor may encourage you, but we act like a penal colony, where every thing has to be penalized do not do anything. i have comorbidities, so i have to get the vaccine, but i cannot say mandating it to everybody. host: on vaccine mandates, the vast majority of systems in this country require children to have a whole series of vaccines to be able to come to public schools. are you ok with those mandates? caller: sure, if the problem

that you are vaccinating against has a higher death rate or something, like a 25% death rate, i can understand that. but most times, 90% of the time, they need to simply encourage you to do something, not mandate anything. host: we are at a seven day average of 2,685 americans dying every day of covid-19. does that concern you, that level? caller: a lot of people die every day. it is just now the reason they are dying is probably conditions plus covid. but we need to worry more about homelessness and stuff. host: this is shown in harvey, illinois, good morning. caller: good morning. i do not want to see the state

regulate or do anything without the science. first of all, the federal government should be running the whole thing, simply because -- i was here in 1955 when dr. jonas salk came out with the polio vaccine. and when he came out with polio, they took it to the schools. they vaccinated all the children. they did not ask the parents, just went ahead and vaccinated them. after that, it was gone. nobody talked about polio anymore. they still do not talk about polio. the thing is they politicized this thing pay this thing has been kicked around like a football. when we came back from vietnam, fighting for the rights of the

vietnamese people, we came back home, states would not let us go. when you leave it to the states, like mississippi, alabama, georgia, we couldn't even vote, but we were fighting over there in vietnam. host: on the issue of mask mandates in schools, do you think that should be something the federal government should say yes or no to every student, nationwide? that is what you're saying? caller: that is right. just like what they were going to do the swine flu, when carter was in there -- host: what would you say to somebody says the school system, the crowding of schools, the spacing issues are different in a city like new york city then in a rural school in montana and that mask mandates should be different for those two systems? caller: the science -- it should totally be controlled by the federal government.

the science would be the same. it will be the same each time for all of the vaccinations. there would be no different one in alabama and a different one in mississippi. just let the federal governor -- come -- just let the federal come in and do it. host: this is blair's town, new jersey. your thoughts on your governor's move? caller: what is wrong with him doing it now? i guess it is a start. the point i am trying to make is, at last week, a johns hopkins study came out saying that these lockdowns only help one for a percent of stopping >> we'll leave this here to keep our over 40-year commitment to live gavel to gavel coverage of congress. the house is about to gavel back in to start debate on continuing government funding through march 11. curr