CORONAVIRUS/JOE BIDEN: “I cannot mandate people wearing masks, but we’ve just been told we should expect another 215,000 dead [from coronavirus] by January. But if we wore a mask, we’d save 100,000 of those lives. Doing nothing but that.
We have to make sure we lay out to the American people the truth. Tell them the truth and those — and I would make sure that I would call every governor in the country into the White House to say you should be putting mandates out if they’re — and if they don’t, I’d call the mayors in their towns and their cities and say put out mandates. You can save lives.
And we should be providing for the PPE, the protective gear that is needed. Look, you know what recently happened? The President of the United States said that no longer would we in fact provide masks for schools — for schools — for them to have the mask in school, because it was not a national emergency. What is he talking about? It’s totally irrational.
And look, this is all about one thing, the stock market. He didn’t want to see anything happen. It’s all about his re-election.
It should be about the American people, and they’re in trouble.”
-Joe Biden, “CNN Presidential Town Hall With Joe Biden,” transcripts.cnn.com, Sep. 17, 2020