COVID-19 policies
On March 17, 2020, Mastriano called for suspension of the HIPAA law to allow the Department of Health share more COVID-19 data, including publishing the names and addresses of those infected with the virus. [23]
On March 28, 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Mastriano proposed legislation that would allow Pennsylvania businesses to reopen if they followed CDC mitigation guidelines, subject to health department and law enforcement inspections. [24] [25]
Mastriano spoke during an anti-lockdown protest held on April 20, 2020, in support of reopening Pennsylvania during the state's ongoing pandemic. [26]
On May 11, 2020, Mastriano called for the resignation of Secretary of Health Rachel Levine, saying she was "being complicit in the virus spreading through our elder care homes, triggered by unscientific and illogical directives, forcing them to readmit COVID-19 patients", and that she was "responsible for the deaths of approximately 2,500 of our citizens, and display[ing] the gross incompetence of someone unfit for office". [27]
In May 2020 Mastriano wrote a letter signed by other Republican state legislators and a county commissioner calling for his home county of Franklin County to move out of the "red" phase of Governor Tom Wolf's reopening plan. At the time Franklin County's seat Chambersburg had one of the highest average daily growth rates of COVID-19 cases in the country. Mastriano's initiative was opposed by the mayor of Chambersburg and two county commissioners. [28]
In response to a Pennsylvania mask-wearing order, Mastriano called for a mask-burning party at a rally in Gettysburg on July 22, 2020. [29] At the rally, Mastriano urged people to reject store employees telling them to wear a mask and "tell them to mind your own business and say you're exempt." [30]
2020 presidential election and positive COVID-19 test results
On November 5, 2020, Mastriano alleged various irregularities in the voting process for the U.S. presidential election and called for the resignation of Secretary of the Commonwealth Kathy Boockvar. He sent a lengthy letter to Boockvar saying that "Nothing is more crucial to Americans than confidence that our voices will be heard through voting," and "Pennsylvanians no longer feel secure in casting their vote." [31]
On November 6, Mastriano and two other state senators, Michele Brooks and Scott Hutchinson, issued a joint memo calling for a full recount "in any counties where state law was broken, regardless of the Department of State’s instructions, as well as in any precinct where questionable actions were demonstrated." [32]
At Mastriano's request, [33] [34] a public meeting of the Republican Party's Majority Policy Committee of the Pennsylvania Senate was held on November 25, 2020, at the Wyndham hotel near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, about claims of election fraud. [36] The meeting, which lasted more than four hours, was organized by Mastriano [37] and chaired by Pennsylvania State Senator Dave Argall. [38] Trump's legal team, including Trump's attorney Rudy Giuliani, gave a lengthy presentation in the meeting, and President Donald Trump himself participated by phone. [38] Trump made false claims at the meeting alleging unfairness in the election process and saying he should be declared the winner. "This election was rigged, and we can't let that happen. This election has to be turned around because we won Pennsylvania by a lot and we won all these swing states by a lot," he said. [39] Immediately after the meeting, Trump invited some of the Pennsylvania lawmakers, including Mastriano, to meet with him in the West Wing of the White House on the same day. [39]
The Republican leadership in the Pennsylvania legislature did not attend Trump's White House meeting, and all those who did participate initially refused to discuss what happened at the meeting. [39]
On November 27, Mastriano and three other state senators announced that they would introduce a resolution to permit the state legislature to appoint delegates to the Electoral College instead of following the results of the presidential vote in the state. The proposed resolution, as circulated in a memorandum seeking additional co-sponsorships, alleges that "officials in the Executive and Judicial Branches of the Commonwealth infringed upon the General Assembly's authority by unlawfully changing the rules governing the November 3, 2020 election in the Commonwealth", and declares, "based on the facts and evidence presented and our own Board of Elections data, that the Presidential election held on November 3, 2020, in Pennsylvania is irredeemably corrupted". [40] [41]
It was then reported on November 29 that Mastriano, who had participated in the meeting with Trump, had left the meeting abruptly upon learning that he had tested positive for COVID-19 infection. [38] In addition to Mastriano himself, Mastriano's son and a friend of his son, who also attended the White House meeting, tested positive as well. [38] All participants of the meeting had been administered a rapid test for the virus as part of the White House health protocol, but the results of the test were not provided to them until they were already in the meeting in the West Wing. [38] It was also reported that Mastriano had not worn a mask during the Gettysburg public meeting that day, which had lasted more than four hours, and all but a few of the other participants were also not wearing masks at the meeting. [38] [42] Some of the participants had ridden in a large van from the Gettysburg meeting to the White House meeting, while Mastriano, his son and his son's friend had driven together in a separate car. [38]
Another Pennsylvania state senator, Judy Ward, who sat next to Mastriano during the public meeting he had organized, tested positive for COVID-19 within five days after the meeting. [37] [43] [44]
After acknowledging that he had testing positive for the virus on his Facebook page on November 30, Mastriano said that his case was "pretty mild", [45] and he appeared that day on The Eric Metaxas Show , with Donald Trump on the phone, supporting Trump's baseless [42] [46] claim that he had won the election. [47] When asked about his infection by conservative radio commentator Glenn Beck the next day, Mastriano replied "I'm feeling fantastic." [45]
Interim Pennsylvania Senate President Jake Corman said that "mistakes were made" in the conduct of the Pennsylvania public meeting, as the organizers of the meeting had allowed a large crowd to attend without following guidelines for social distancing and mask-wearing. [37] The meeting participants were also not screened for symptoms of infection. [37] Corman said "There is no penalty, but you have to review what happened, acknowledge that there were mistakes, and make sure there are policies in place so that it doesn't happen again." [37] Pennsylvania political leaders had been warned by federal officials a few days before the meeting that the state had entered the "red zone" for the percentage of positive virus test results indicating uncontrolled spreading of COVID-19 in the community, and they had been previously warned that the state was also in the "red zone" for the number of confirmed cases per capita in the state population. [34]
In the wake of the recent events, the editorial board of the York Dispatch , the local newspaper of York County, Pennsylvania, wrote an opinion article on December 2 that strongly criticized Mastriano's actions relating to the election. [48] The editorial described him as someone who "regularly spouts his love of freedom" but has a relationship to Trump that had been "exposed as nothing more than a vassal doing his master's bidding", and said his actions were that of a "craven oligarch" making a "shocking call for tyranny" in a "campaign to undercut democracy itself for a generation". [48]
Conversely, on December 6, 2020, local pastor Tyler Weidler of York Springs in Mastriano's district wrote to the Gettysburg Times that "On Election Day, I had the joy of helping his campaign. I lost count of the number of people who told me to thank Doug personally for getting their businesses open, fighting for their jobs, and giving them hope during the worst of the shutdown. He is a hero here... I thank God for sending Doug Mastriano for such a time as this." [49]
The Philadelphia Inquirer reported on December 5, 2020 that Mastriano's involvement with Trump in disputing the election results had raised his profile, and that he might become a candidate for Governor of Pennsylvania in the 2022 election. [50]
