On Monday, President Donald Trump demanded that a reporter remove his face mask during a press conference, and a video of the tense encounter has been going viral ever since. Americans are outraged that the commander-in-chief directly ordered a citizen to disobey public health officials' recommendations, and showed such frustration when he didn't. Many on social media are sharing their theories about this bizarre move by Trump.
Trump was accepting questions from reporters in a White House press conference on Monday when he called on Reuters' Jeff Mason. Mason began speaking, but Trump interrupted him, saying: "You're gonna have to take that off. Please, you can take it off, you're — how many feet are you away?" Mason offered to "speak much louder," but Trump sputtered: "Well, if you don't take it off, you're very muffled, so if you would take it off it would be a lot easier."
The awkward encounter came to a close with Trump visibly fuming at Mason for not removing his mask. Speaking up into the microphone, Mason asked if he sounded better. Trump responded with obvious sarcasm: "It's... better, yeah. It's better."
The clip has drawn a mixture of jokes and serious criticism online. While many users are poking fun at the president's short patience, or theorizing that he is losing his hearing, others question the aggressive, controlling nature of his demands. They think that Trump should face consequences for trying to force an American to operate outside of their comfort zone during a pandemic.
Mason was far from Trump during the press conference, but he was well within the range of other reporters and staff members. Many critics online speculate that Trump did not consider or care about their safety in this case, telling Mason he was "far away" enough to remove his mask, referring only to the distance between the two of them.
Trump later tweeted angrily about the encounter and the news coverage of it, re-posting a photo of reporters standing close together outdoors with no masks. One held a mask in his hand instead of on his face, and Trump wrote: "Same guy that didn't want to take off his mask yesterday in asking a question while being very socially distanced. Fake News!" As fact-checkers on Twitter pointed out, this was not from the same day, and may not have been Mason at all.
Either way, critics say that Trump has politicized masks, other safety measures and the coronavirus pandemic in general, making it all the harder for Americans to keep information straight during this crisis. Here is a look at how social media responded to Trump and Mason's awkward encounter on Monday.