July 12, 2020

The Big Boy President Wore a Big Boy Mask And Now the Election Is Over, Aides Say

This is the sort of positive reinforcement people use on dogs.

President Donald Trump wears a mask as he walks down the hallway during his visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., Saturday, July 11, 2020. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)

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“They said this day would never come”—Barack Obama once said that, referring to his historic victory in the 2008 Iowa caucuses. But I also said it—aloud to myself, when I saw this photo of President Donald Trump wearing a mask on a visit to Walter Reed Army Medical Center on Saturday:

For months, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state and local governing bodies have advised Americans to wear masks indoors and in situations where social distancing is impossible, in order to slow the spread of Coronavirus. But Trump has made a point of not wearing one (and of not social-distancing, for that matter). Unlike you, he gets tested regularly, as do those around him, but—like Gerald Ford getting his flu shot—it’s the symbolism that matters as much as anything.

One might think wearing a mask in front of photographers for the first time in July would be a source of tremendous embarrassment, like realizing 40 minutes into your commute that you are not wearing pants. CNN reported that Trump’s aides had spent months trying to convince him to wear a mask. But when the first images dropped, Trump’s campaign orbit was on-message: He looks totally badass. And also: the presidential election is now over.

 

This is like putting up a huge sign on the White House lawn that says “Days Without an Accident: 1.” Congrats to the Big Boy president! The president’s most loyal supporters are treating “the president following his government’s own guidelines on the plague” like proud parents of a toddler who just cursed for the first time. This is the sort of positive reinforcement people use on dogs. There might well be some truth to the idea that Trump wearing a mask four months into a pandemic that has killed nearly 140,000 Americans will effectively settle the election. But it might not be the outcome they want.

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We have a considerable $390,000 gap in our online fundraising budget that we have to close by June 30. There is no wiggle room, we've already cut everything we can, and we urgently need more readers to pitch in—especially from this specific blurb you're reading right now.

We'll also be quite transparent and level-headed with you about this.

In "News Never Pays," our fearless CEO, Monika Bauerlein, connects the dots on several concerning media trends that, taken together, expose the fallacy behind the tragic state of journalism right now: That the marketplace will take care of providing the free and independent press citizens in a democracy need, and the Next New Thing to invest millions in will fix the problem. Bottom line: Journalism that serves the people needs the support of the people. That's the Next New Thing.

And it's what MoJo and our community of readers have been doing for 47 years now.

But staying afloat is harder than ever.

In "This Is Not a Crisis. It's The New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, why this moment is particularly urgent, and how we can best communicate that without screaming OMG PLEASE HELP over and over. We also touch on our history and how our nonprofit model makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there: Letting us go deep, focus on underreported beats, and bring unique perspectives to the day's news.

You're here for reporting like that, not fundraising, but one cannot exist without the other, and it's vitally important that we hit our intimidating $390,000 number in online donations by June 30.

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