COVID-19 or South Carolina school children? Pick a side, Attorney General Alan Wilson
Nonsense.
That’s the best way to sum up the introduction from the lawsuit South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson filed today to stop Columbia from mandating that masks be worn in city schools.
“We understand and respect the concerns that citizens and governments have about the spread of Covid 19 and its variants. This case is not about what policies are best for dealing with the virus,” it begins.
If Wilson truly understood or cared about the very real concerns people have about catching and spreading a virus that has left more than 10,000 South Carolinians dead, he would let Columbia and other towns and school districts make their own decisions about what is best for their communities.
When Wilson stopped the University of South Carolina from implementing a mask mandate - a mandate the state Supreme Court has since said is permitted - he used the opportunity as a fundraiser.
“The fight over vaccines and masks has never been about science or health,” Wilson’s fundraising email said, in part. “It’s about expanding the government’s control over our daily lives. I won’t stand for it.”
His email continued, “unelected bureaucrats at the CDC and liberal politicians at every level of government are determined to use the COVID crisis as an excuse to dramatically expand their interference in, and control over, every decision YOU make. They won’t get away with it.”
What will his next fundraising letter look like?
Perhaps, “I stopped our towns and schools from protecting children. Send cash.”
Wilson is arguing that a proviso stuffed into the budget with little fanfare makes the mask mandates illegal.
The proviso reads, “No school district, or any of its schools, may use any funds appropriated or authorized pursuant to this act to require that its students and/or employees wear a facemask at any of its education facilities. This prohibition extends to the announcement or enforcement of any such policy.”
Senior Assistant City Attorney Patrick Wright, however, argues that Columbia’s mask rule for elementary and middle school students is legal because a mandate prohibition rolled into the state budget is not germane to fiscal issues or raising and spending taxes.
A number of state legislators have called for a special session to rescind the proviso, a call that has so far gone unheeded.
While the legal question on the proviso may be answered by the Supreme Court, Wilson’s track record leaves us wondering if he is more concerned with being the state’s chief legal officer or pandering to the crowd he hopes will give him the keys to higher office.
In 2020, Wilson joined Texas in an effort to try to overturn the results of President Joe Biden’s election.
The Supreme Court wouldn’t take the case, noting that Texas didn’t have standing.
In 2014, Wilson defended the state’s ban on gay marriage, a law that was undone when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that states must permit same-sex couples from marrying and recognize their unions.
If Wilson wants to stand up for the people of South Carolina, defend their right to protect themselves and their children from a deadly virus, don’t take them to court.
This story was originally published August 19, 2021 at 2:52 PM with the headline "COVID-19 or South Carolina school children? Pick a side, Attorney General Alan Wilson."