When millions of Californians return to work in person to ask if they have been vaccinated for COVID-19, lawmakers representing some of those residents have refused to publish, ignoring the issue or insisting their employers, the state taxpayers, have no right to know. :
In a poll conducted by The Times, 12 members of the California Legislature refused to disclose their COVID-19 vaccine status. Eleven of the legislators are Republicans, who make up almost 40% of all GOP members.
There are no current requirements for lawmakers to be vaccinated, and a number of safety protocols are in place within the state Capitol. Even so, there are few, if any, consequences for lawmakers who prefer not to get vaccinated. The Capitol guidelines advise lawmakers and staff to provide vaccine information to health officials, but members of the state Senate չունեն Assembly do not have a traditional administrator at work, and for the most part respond only to their constituents.
“I’m not going because it’s my choice,” state Sen. Brian Dehl (R-Bieber) said Monday when asked why he refused to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
Dahle և and his wife, Megan Dahle (R-Bieber), both refused to answer vaccine questions this week as the legislature convened. Several other lawmakers also rejected the Times’ repeated attempts to determine the status of their vaccines or to find out why they were willing to provide them.
“I’m not answering any of these questions,” said James Ames Gallagher, a congregation in Ruba, as he walked toward the convention.
Some lawmakers, who did not comment, revealed last year that they had signed a contract with COVID-19. Last summer, Assembly President Ashun Burke (D-Marina del Rey) He said that he had a positive result against COVID-19A few weeks later, in the final days of the legislative session, State Senator Brian Ones (R-Santi) found out that he also tried positively,
And Burke and Jones declined to comment on their vaccine status when they arrived in Sacramento this week and did not say whether they believed the COVID-19 infection had given them adequate immunity. At least three other lawmakers who were also infected with COVID-19 last year told the Times they had been vaccinated. Assembly members Tom Lucky (R-Palmdale) և Patrick O’Donnell (D-Long Beach) և Senator osh Osh Newman (D-Fullerton).
Burke was the only Democrat in the Legislature who did not provide information on his status with the COVID-19 vaccine. Others said they had been completely vaccinated.
Because Democrats have a majority in both the Senate and the Assembly, their almost universal vaccination status, which appears in The Times, would mean that at least 90% of the legislature is vaccinated, more than the majority of the vaccinated population. According to government statistics released this week, just over half of California residents are fully vaccinated against the disease.
But data provided by Senate և Assembly administrators show that the percentage of legislative vaccinations decreases as staff members are added to the mix, bringing the legislative vaccination rate to 85%.
Several Democrat lawmakers wanted to talk about their vaccinations.
“The answer is hell, yes, I’m dissatisfied with the fact that scientific deniers come to the Capitol to infect people infected with COVID,” said Mark Levine (D-Greenbrae) posted on Twitter After contacting The Times. “We have families. Do not endanger everyone. “
On Wednesday, a group of Democratic lawmakers posed for pictures on the steps of the Capitol wearing T-shirts emblazoned with the word “PAT AC AR.” The second photo showed lawmakers putting their masks in the air to celebrate.
The rage comes amid growing concerns in the state about an increase in the number of COVID-19 cases triggered by the dangerous Delta version. նվազ Decreased vaccination ratesOver the past two and a half weeks, Congress has reported 10 confirmed cases of the virus. Four of them were with people who said they were fully vaccinated. The San Francisco Chronicle reported Sunday that Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Lakewood) discusses necessary COVID-19 vaccines after the last outbreak.
“At some point, there is no doubt that vaccinations will be mandatory,” said Professor David Magnus, a professor at Stanford University’s Center for Biomedical Ethics. “We just have to understand that this is not a matter of personal autonomy, this is a matter of public health. There has to be a balance. “
The Assembly’s highest-ranking Republican, Marie Waldron, the GOP leader of the Assembly in downtown Valley, San Diego, has not responded to repeated requests for information. But he urged the legislature to sit in Sacramento this year after last year’s public health outages, taking part in work that typically includes long hours in the narrow capitol area of the state.
“Legislators need to work this year to stay afloat despite the epidemic,” he said in a Facebook post in January.
Waldron վ Six other Assembly members declined to comment on their vaccine status. With the exception of Burke, Delhi, and Gallagher, The Times could not obtain information from Assemblywoman Lorry Davis (R-Laguna Niguel), Assemblywoman Kelly Seyarto (R-Murietta), or Assemblyman Thurston Smith (R-Apple Valley).
“I do not discuss my medical records with anyone other than my husband, my doctor,” Davis told the Times.
A similar response was received by Smith, whose spokesman said in an email that staff “do not disclose Assembly Smith’s personal health to members of the media or voters.”
In the Senate of a 40-member state, with the exception of five lawmakers, all those who say they are fully vaccinated are the Democrats-Republicans. The five who refused to do so are Dehl, ones ounce և Sense. Shannon Grove (R-Bakersfield), Melissa Melendes (R-Lake Elsinore) և Rosilis Ochoa Bog (R-Yukaipa).
Magnus noted that only those with underlying medical conditions – serious, well-established religious objections – should be exempted from the COVID-19 vaccine.
“As long as they do not meet those standards, there is really no legitimate reason not to get vaccinated. “Otherwise, they are doing something wrong that endangers other people,” he said.
For some Republicans, the topic of COVID-19 vaccines can be politically thorny when it comes to supporters who may be skeptical about the safety or necessity of the vaccine.
Bog, a first-term Republican who won the Inland Empire in 2020, where Democrats have a slight lead in voter registration, made a public service announcement this year introducing the COVID-19 vaccine as “one of our most powerful tools against this virus.” one. “But he avoided taking a clear position on the urgency of vaccinations.
“If you choose to get vaccinated, you must first get available,” the senator said in the video.
Unvaccinated Californians say the state’s federal health officials must wear a face mask in front of the public to keep at least six feet of physical distance. Many retailers և other companies have signs that, in particular, require unvaccinated customers to adhere to mask mandates և physical removal rules.
Rules in the state Capitol require all legislators, staff, and visitors to wear masks. Only when the legislator or staff member is alone in a closed door office do legislators say they can take off their mask. A policy reaffirmed at the Assembly this month after a bunch of new cases.
Anyone who has not been vaccinated or who refuses to report their status should be tested twice a week for COVID-19, lawmakers said.
It is unclear whether any of the dozens of lawmakers who refused to discuss their status were not vaccinated against COVID-19. If so, the photos some of them posted on their social networks may raise concerns about whether they are at risk of contracting the disease or spreading it to supporters and voters.
And Sen. Dahl, Դ Congressman Dahl, posted photos in May-June of themselves disguised as they stand with voters in their rural Northern California neighborhood, often shoulder to shoulder with locals. Davis, who was selected to represent part of Orange County last November, posted similar photos during the July 4 vacation.
Seyarto, who represents the Riverside region where former President Trump won a double-digit victory last fall, posted photos on Facebook this month of various events where he was not masked, including photos of others in disguise.
Grove, Former Senate GOP leaderHe did not wear a mask while attending a major Christian music concert outside the Capitol last summer, which drew criticism from Sacramento County health officials. Last week, he posted a photo of himself standing next to a documentary about a concert by Sean Foychtz.
Although disclosure of private vaccine status could rightfully be restricted to employers for most Californians, the equation is changing for those who serve in an elected office “accountable only to voters,” Magnus said.
“There is no one for whom they work the way others work,” he said. “Politicians, as public figures, fall into many different categories.”
Times staff writers Patrick McGrew, Phil Willon, Tarin Luna, Ari Plachthan և Melody Gutierrez contributed to this story.