NASHVILLE, Tenn. (Mike Osborne) -- Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander is urging President Donald Trump to wear a mask in public as the number of COVID-19 cases surge nationwide.
CNN quotes the Republican Senator on Sunday saying health experts now agree wearing a mask can be helpful in containing the infection.
Alexander went on to say “it would help if from time to time the President would wear one to help us get rid of this political debate that says if you're for Trump, you don't wear a mask, if you're against Trump, you do."
President Trump recently told the Wall Street Journal that masks are a political statement meant to show disapproval of his policies.
Senator Alexander has been generally supportive of President Trump. However, he has clashed with his fellow Republican on some issues.
This past fall, for example, Alexander and ten other Senate Republicans joined 43 Democrats to pass a bill terminating President Trump’s emergency declaration authorizing diversion of military funding to pay for border wall construction. Alexander insisted that Congress’ power of the purse must be protected.
“Our nation’s founders gave to Congress, a Congress elected by the people, the power to approve all spending so that the president would not have too much power,” Alexander said.
President Trump vetoed that bill and continue to divert military funding to wall construction. However, this past week the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal ruled Trump’s diversion of those funds unconstitutional.
