The major Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate on Wednesday night rejected any proposal to mandate the wearing of masks as a way of slowing the spread of the coronavirus.
Congressman Roger Marshall, former Secretary of State Kris Kobach and former Johnson County Commissioner David Lindstrom said they opposed requiring people to wear masks because it would impede on individual freedoms.
However, Marshall, a physician, nuanced his answer saying that businesses should have the right to require masks for their customers.
The question about the masks came up during an hour-long debate broadcast Wednesday night on Facebook from Wichita.
It was the third of four U.S. Senate debates sponsored by the Kansas Republican Party. A debate is being held in each of the state’s congressional districts.
Republican Bob Hamilton did not participate in Wednesday’s debate because his daughter is getting married Saturday.
The mask question came up at a time when COVID-19 cases are escalating nationally as the economy reopens and health professionals are recommending masks as way of containing the spread of the disease.
CNN recently reported that 15 states – not counting Nevada and Washington – have some type of law in place requiring face coverings.
The governor of Washington has already announced a mask mandate that starts Friday. A similar directive was issued by the governor of Nevada. It starts Thursday.
Mayors in about a dozen south Florida cities have already announced mandates to wear masks in public spaces, prompting one lawsuit that contends it’s unconstitutional.
“We should have the freedom to make the choice and I don’t like the mask shaming that is going on on the left,” Kobach said.
Kobach said he hasn’t worn a mask in at least a week.
“If I were to travel on a plane, sure, I would put a mask on,” Kobach said. “If I had some reason to go on a New York subway, yeah, I would put a mask on at that point.”
Marshall, too, said that it should be up to people to make a choice about wearing a mask.
“A little Kansas common sense goes a long way,” Marshall said. “Of course, I am not going to be in favor of any federal mandates that say you have to wear a mask.
“I think it is up to the individual,” he said. “At the same time, I think that a place of business should have the right to say that we need you to wear a mask when you come in.”
Lindstrom took a similar position as Marshall and Kobach.
“We have a free country,” Lindstrom said. “People ought to have the right to wear a mask if they want to.
“If they don’t want to wear a mask they shouldn’t have to wear a mask. But you don’t need to congregate with someone who you feel is going to contaminate you.”
Lindstrom criticized what he saw as a hypocrisy of limiting the size of church gatherings while letting some big box retail outlets operate without limits.
Kobach said the political left is trying to use the pandemic to impose “oppressive” and “totalitarian” rules that limit movement and the size of gatherings.
“What our party’s soul is about is choice, liberty, freedom and responsibility,” he said. “If you’re going to choose not to wear a mask you take responsibility for that choice.”
The debate was marked by a couple of run-ins between Kobach and Marshall, the two front runners in the 11-person field.
Kobach criticized Marshall from being absent from Congress the day the House voted on a $3 trillion coronavirus relief bill pushed by Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“He didn’t show up to vote ‘no’ because he was here in Kansas for a photo op,” Kobach said.
“You know who did show up to vote against Nancy Pelosi’s bill? Sharice Davids, the Democrat representing Kansas’ 3rd District.
“She showed up and voted against Nancy Pelosi, but the Republican representative from the 1st District of Kansas couldn’t be bothered to show up.”
“Sharice Davids did more for Republicans shooting down that Pelosi bill than Roger Marshall did,” he said.
Marshall said the criticism was unfair since he was working in the field to help treat Kansans with COVID-19.
At the time of the vote, Marshall was in the last day of a self-imposed quarantine after working in the emergency room at Southwest Medical Center in Liberal two weeks earlier, a spokesman told The Kansas City Star.
“This is another attack by a desperate, failed candidate who has failed President Trump,” Marshall fired back.
“When I saw this virus exploding in southwest Kansas, I went down there and helped organize testing, ” he said.
“I helped within the ICUs. I helped within the ERs. I guess this is just about as low as you can get for a failed candidate to attack me for helping take care of Kansans.
“I will always choose helping out Kansans when I have that particular choice.”
