Once, he mandated masks; now, he bans them.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a ban Saturday that prohibits all law enforcement officers — except the California Highway Patrol, which protects former Vice President Kamala Harris — from wearing masks. The measure is aimed at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers — over whom acting U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli said Newsom has “no jurisdiction.”
As Breitbart News reported last week, the bill, SB 627, was proposed by radical State Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) — the same politician responsible for such extreme legislation as the “sanctuary state” for transgender surgeries for minors. The true aim of the law, ostensibly aimed at protecting the public from “secret police,” is to make it easier for left-wing groups to retaliate against, and intimidate, ICE officials.
Newsom’s office boasted that he had signed “the nation’s strongest laws to protect residents from tactics being employed by President Trump and Stephen Miller’s secret police.” However, California has no authority to regulate ICE, due to the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause. Acting U.S. Attorney Essayli said that the law will have “no effect” on ICE operations, and dared Newsom to ban masks among criminals.
Ironically, Newsom’s California enforced some of the nation’s toughest mask and vaccine mandates during the coronavirus pandemic. When thousands of people flocked to the coast in Orange County in April 2020, on the first warm weekend of the year, Newsom ordered the beaches there closed, despite the low risk of outdoor transmission. (He himself dined, maskless, at the elite French Laundry despite his own guidelines.)
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Zionist Conspiracy Wants You, now available on Amazon. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
