| | |  | BY KATHRYN A. WOLFE | With help from Aubree Eliza Weaver
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A passenger wears a mask while sitting on a plane. | Michael Loccisano/Getty Images | UN-COVERED — This week, the CEO of United Airlines said the quiet part out loud: Mask mandates on planes won’t be coming back. “I think it’s very unlikely that a mask mandate requirement is going to come back any time in the foreseeable future,” Scott Kirby said in an interview Thursday on NBC News. And he’s probably right. Earlier this week, a Florida judge appointed by former President Donald Trump tossed out the federal mandate that requires people to cover their faces on planes and other kinds of public transportation. Even though later in the week the DOJ announced they would be appealing the ruling, soon after the Florida decision, the Transportation Security Administration announced that it wouldn’t be enforcing it, at least for the moment. The airline industry pounced, ordering its workforce en masse to stop making people wear masks. And that’s probably how it will be going forward, thanks to industry pressure and the creep of pre-2020 normalcy — no matter what happens with the Justice Department’s pending appeal of the decision. For one thing, it’s going to be tough to put that genie back into the bottle. And the U.S. airline industry doesn’t want it put back — the industry has been pressing for months to get rid of the mask mandate on board planes, arguing that it makes no sense for it to continue as Covid restrictions wane across the country. Many flight attendants cheered the court decision, happy to be out from under worrying that telling someone to wear a mask will mean a punch in the face. The Federal Aviation Administration’s statistics suggest that a strong majority — some 70 percent of incidents reported this year — of unruly passenger behavior is triggered by mask issues, even if it escalates from there. The wind was already blowing this way long before the suit was tossed. The biggest wink-wink on this score may have been the CDC’s latest decision to extend the mandate. Instead of extending it for a month, as the agency has done for some time now, it decided to only extend it for two weeks, to give the agency time to see how the newest variant was affecting hospitalization and death figures. There are still concerns about safety, though, especially with a new Omicron variant spreading rapidly. And one of the ways infectious diseases spread far and wide is through travel. So the decision becomes whether vaccines and other precautions are robust enough to remove the mandate, in hopes that it will mean air crew will be less likely to have to bean an angry passenger with a coffee pot, have their teeth knocked down their throat or endure a host of other horrible behavior that’s been inflicted upon them. Airlines are likely hoping the return to something closer to normal will begin to lure back business travel, as well. Though passenger volumes are beginning to surge with the arrival of warmer weather, it’s mostly been people jetting away for that Disneyland vacation they’ve been putting off since 2020. Business travelers, who are less sensitive to costs and more eager to pay for perks, have been much slower to return. The industry is banking on calming Covid fears by pointing to the robust filtration systems installed on modern airliners, which some studies have shown can filter out virus particles. However, other studies have come to different conclusions, and no matter how supercharged a plane’s filter is for airborne particles, it’s not going to help much if someone in the rows adjacent to you spews particles your way. Americans aren’t sold yet, though. A POLITICO/Morning Consult poll published Wednesday shows most of those surveyed prefer to keep requiring masks for a little while longer — some 59 percent supported extending it through May 3. Welcome to POLITICO Nightly. Reach out with news, tips and ideas at nightly@politico.com. Or contact tonight’s author at kwolfe@politico.com, or on Twitter at @kathrynwolfe.
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A video of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy speaking during a press conference. | POLITICO | — McCarthy’s speaker dreams could be in jeopardy over Trump comments: Newly released audio showing that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy wanted Donald Trump to resign in the wake of the Jan. 6 insurrection has prompted allies of the former president to question whether McCarthy is fit for the top job in the House. While the GOP leader is still seen as the overwhelming favorite to be speaker in 2023, given Republicans’ likelihood of taking back the House, it could endanger McCarthy’s chances to win over a necessary block of pro-Trump Republicans — particularly if Trump comes out against McCarthy’s speakership bid. — Madison Cawthorn photos reveal him wearing women’s lingerie in public setting: Photographs obtained by POLITICO appear to show Madison Cawthorn, the embattled Republican congressman from North Carolina who recently accused his GOP colleagues of inviting him to orgies, wearing lingerie in what appears to be a party setting . After the story was published, Cawthorn tweeted that the photos were taken of him during a game on a cruise before he was elected to Congress. “I guess the left thinks goofy vacation photos during a game on a cruise (taken waaay before I ran for Congress) is going to somehow hurt me? They’re running out of things to throw at me... Share your most embarrassing vacay pics in the replies.” — Jan. 6 panel gets inconsistent testimony on key Trump family conversation: The Jan. 6 committee has received apparently inconsistent testimony from key witnesses on a notable point : just how much effort it took Ivanka Trump to persuade her father to criticize the attack. Three months ago, the panel sent a letter to Ivanka Trump asking her to voluntarily cooperate with its investigators. Chair Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) said investigators wanted to ask her about former President Donald Trump’s behavior as the attack unfolded. The letter homed in on White House staffers’ efforts to get Trump to speak out against the unfolding violence. — Voting rights groups sue Florida over new congressional map: Several voting rights and civil rights organizations as well as a Democratic-aligned redistricting group today sued over Florida’s new congressional map that hands significant gains to Republicans and dismantles the North Florida seat now held by a Black Democrat. The League of Women Voters of Florida, which successfully challenged Florida’s last round of maps passed a decade ago, filed the lawsuit in circuit court in Leon County, along with other organizations such as Black Voters Matters and Florida Rising, as well as 12 voters living across the state. — Vance surge remakes Ohio Senate race: More than $5 million in new donations have poured into a pro-Vance super PAC — just weeks earlier, it had spent nearly all of its available funds . Vance, the author of the book “Hillbilly Elegy,” has taken the lead in polling for the first time since entering the crowded Republican primary in July. The catalytic effect of Trump’s endorsement in Ohio helps explain why Republican candidates across the nation have gone to such extreme lengths to win his favor this election cycle. It’s a reminder of his hold on the party base, and of the prospect that he could still shake up Senate GOP primaries in Arizona, Missouri and New Hampshire — all states where he has yet to issue an endorsement — and Alabama, where Trump rescinded his earlier endorsement of Rep. Mo Brooks.
| | UPSTATE’S DOWNTURN — Aubree Eliza Weaver emails us from Syracuse, N.Y.: This morning, the CDC updated its Covid Community Levels map to mark 40 counties across the U.S. as “high” risk, urging their residents to take added precautions like resume wearing masks indoors. Of those 40 counties, 23 are in New York, and all 23 are in the Upstate region, including my hometown, Syracuse. Last week, the recommendations applied to 10 Upstate counties. The week before, three. The majority of the country is still safely in the green, and easing back into pre-pandemic activities and socialization, while Upstate seems to be progressing backwards. What makes that pill even harder to swallow is the way so many of my fellow Orange approach masking, vaxxing and socially distanced relaxing. Even when mask requirements were in full effect, it was never surprising to walk into a drugstore or Wegmans and see just as many folks wandering without masks as those donning their KN95s. But now, even in a spike, those masked seem to be farther and fewer between. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve recently entered a building, only to be greeted by staff with the friendly reminder: “Oh, you don’t need to wear that here.” As of April 20, there were approximately 392 cases per 100,000 residents in Onondaga County — surpassed by only two other counties in New York State, Oswego and Oneida, both of which directly neighbor us. Onondaga was also recently reported to be the first county in New York hit with a new, more contagious strain of the omicron variant, BA2.12. It’s both fascinating and alarming to live in an area where Covid is once again on the rise and making headlines, as nationally, other news is outpacing the nearly two years of a constant pandemic news cycle. This week alone, the following stories have topped local news sites: “Gov. Hochul visits Syracuse to discuss uptick in Covid-19 cases,” “Covid hospitalizations in Onondaga County nearly double in three weeks,” “ Syracuse University to require masks during classes, some events as Covid cases rise.” While so many of my friends outside of the state are planning for summer adventures, anticipating a further decline in cases, I know at least three close friends and their families in the area who have tested positive this month alone — none of whom know each other or contracted Covid from the same place.
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| | DON'T MISS ANYTHING FROM THE 2022 MILKEN INSTITUTE GLOBAL CONFERENCE: POLITICO is excited to partner with the Milken Institute to produce a special edition "Global Insider" newsletter featuring exclusive coverage and insights from the 25th annual Global Conference. This year's event, May 1-4, brings together more than 3,000 of the world’s most influential leaders, including 700+ speakers representing more than 80 countries. "Celebrating the Power of Connection" is this year's theme, setting the stage to connect influencers with the resources to change the world with leading experts and thinkers whose insight and creativity can implement that change. Whether you're attending in person or following along from somewhere else in the world, keep up with this year's conference with POLITICO’s special edition “Global Insider” so you don't miss a beat. Subscribe today. | | | | | | | Nightly asked you: Have you traveled on a plane, train or bus this week, and if so, tell us about the masking environment? Did you feel comfortable traveling? Here are some of your lightly edited responses. “I commute to work by bus every day. I am also one who trusts and believes science and doctors and I have been wearing a mask, distancing, getting vaxxed and boosted and doing everything else the CDC recommends. I will likely continue to wear a mask when riding as it seems to be protecting me not just from the coronavirus, but colds and flu as well. Compared to the sacrifices others are making (Ukraine come to mind?) in the world, putting a small piece of cloth over my nose and mouth doesn’t really seem like such a big deal.” — Dave Etienne, marketing director, Cincinnati “I flew out of Oakland and was so excited not to wear a mask. But people looked at me like I had three heads. I would say that 95 percent of passengers wore masks. I’m vaccinated with two boosters, but this is the Bay Area. Got a lot of dirty looks!” — Jeff Burns, commercial mortgage banker, Danville, Calif. “With about only 30 percent of fellow passengers and no airplane staff wearing masks on a return trip from New Orleans to Chicago, our family will be canceling our reservations for YMCA of the Rockies this June. Too risky for fully vaxxed grandparents.” — Thom Clarke, retired, Chicago “I traveled on D.C.’s Metro system this week, Monday-Wednesday. The environment was unchanged from before the mandate repeal. Most people were still masked. A few were not, but no more than before! I felt as comfortable as before, which is to say, not terribly comfortable.” — Susan Ryan, law librarian, Silver Spring, Md. “About 30 percent of the travelers in the airports (Wichita, DFW, and Houston George Bush) and on my planes were wearing masks. About half of the workers were. I was wearing a high quality mask, as was my adult son who was traveling with me. I was uncomfortable but not overly concerned.” — Bruce Tannahill, attorney, Wichita, Kan. “I traveled via commuter rail into Boston on Tuesday of this week and took it again Thursday. On Tuesday, masking was required, Thursday it wasn’t, but I will be keeping my mask on. The ridership is still much lower than it was pre-pandemic so it is always possible to keep a full space between myself and the other passengers, so between the space and the masking I felt very comfortable.” — Emily Norton, nonprofit director, Newton, Mass.
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Chippendales dancer Miguel Rivera prepares for a virtual Zoom party from his home in Las Vegas. Rivera is one of a few Chippendale dancers doing virtual shows while the live show is shut down due to the coronavirus. | John Locher/AP Photo | FROM HEART-THROBBY TO LOBBY — Chippendales, the famed male dancer troupe, has turned to K Street to help it tap into a potential new round of federal pandemic aid, Caitlin Oprysko reports. The iconic franchise, known for commanding the attention of bachelorette parties lined across the Rio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, retained the services of white shoe law and lobbying firm Greenberg Traurig to lobby on a pandemic-era program designed to help concert halls, movie theaters and others in the live events industry, according to a disclosure filed this week. Lobbying records show it’s the first time Chippendales has retained federal lobbyists. And it’s further evidence that the pandemic has pushed businesses of all stripes — and sartorial reputations — to turn to the government for a lifeline amid difficult economic times. As the world shut down in the spring of 2020, the closures hit the live events industry especially hard, and the Chippendales, like any other business, had to adapt to the new normal after canceling its “Get Naughty” Tour and Vegas performances. The show’s performers began posting quarantine workout tutorials on social media, donning their signature uniform of only bow ties, cuffs and shorts. A few weeks later, Chippendales debuted Chippendales@Home, half-hour virtual stripteases performed over Zoom, Facetime or Google Hangouts — though the company offered free virtual performances to health care workers, first responders, and ticket holders to a since-canceled show. Chippendales dancers have since returned to the stage. And shows this spring, hosted by “Jersey Shore” star Vinny Guadagnino, have packed the dancers’ showroom once again, according to local news reports. But their lobbying hire comes as lawmakers on the Hill weigh one final round of Covid assistance for small businesses that would, in the case of entertainment venues, include additional money for venues and extend the date by which grant recipients could incur reimbursable expenses. The Chippendales did not respond to a request for comment prior to publication. Did someone forward this email to you? Sign up here. | |
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