On Saturday, Joe Biden and his wife Jill were seen without masks at a fancy restaurant in Washington, D.C.’s Georgetown neighborhood, in violation of both D.C. policy and the restaurant’s policy, according to Fox News.
The two were spotted at Fiona Mare, an expensive Italian seafood restaurant on the Potomac River; they went to the restaurant after attending a service in Georgetown’s Holy Trinity Catholic Church. Footage was captured of the two leaving the restaurant without any masks on, even as the Secret Service agents surrounding them all had to wear masks.
Since July, D.C. has reimplemented an indoor mask mandate for all people irrespective of vaccination status. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D-D.C.) ordered the return of the arbitrary and unpopular restriction due to a rise in the India variant of the Chinese coronavirus, also known as the “Delta” variant.
Fiona Mare’s website dictates a similar policy, ordering that “all individuals over age 2 are required to wear a mask indoors, regardless of vaccination status. Masks must be always worn while in our restaurants, except while eating and drinking.”
Any business that does not enforce the rules laid out in Bowser’s executive order may face fines or even a complete shutdown of operations. However, Bowser made an exception for federal employees and executive officials, stating that “the enforcement provisions of this Order shall not be applied to persons in the federal government or legislative branch of the District government while those persons are on duty.”
Biden, who has been vaccinated, has frequently demanded that all Americans wear masks, even though it has been proven that masks are largely ineffective at stopping or slowing the spread of diseases such as the coronavirus.