Medically obese, health-conscious Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams says school kids must keep wearing masks

The Democrats’ former candidate for the Georgia gubernatorial race and party organizer Stacey Abrams took to CNN today to say that Georgia “is not at a place where” schools can stop forcing kids to wear masks.

Like many other states, Georgia is moving to lift the mask mandates for kids in schools, based largely on data that found insufficient support for their efficacy in stopping the spread of the virus.

Asked if she would lift the mask mandates if she were the governor of Georgia, Abrams, who is medically obese, said, “COVID hygiene is going to b a point of debate for a very long time and we can only follow the science and follow our circumstances. Unfortunately in Georgia we’re not at a place where that conversation is ready because we have one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country.”

“We have 40% of our counties without general paediatricians and we’ve refused to expand Medicaid so so many families don’t have access to healthcare,” she added.

“I believe that our job is to protect children and I know that educators and parents have to balance protection and education and that is a complicated issue. I think that each governor has to evaluate where they are, and look to the CDC,” said Abrams.

Made her comments just days after she was photographed maskless in a public school surrounded by children in masks in a photo-op.

Abrams, who is running again for Georgia governor, posed maskless at a Glennwood Elementary School classroom just outside of Atlanta, while all the students around her in the photo were masked up, per the mandate.

Following a public backlash, Abrams slammed the criticism as a “false political attack,” framing it as racist to attack a black woman during Black History Month.

"It is shameful that our opponents are using a Black History Month reading event for Georgia children as the impetus for a false political attack, and it is pitiful and predictable that our opponents continue to look for opportunities to distract from their failed records when it comes to protecting public health during the pandemic," a statement from the Abrams campaign reads.