Governor Gretchen Whitmer was spotted without her mask while visiting a bar in Washington, DC on Tuesday evening despite local pandemic rules requiring wearing masks indoors.
Restrictions require customers to wear masks in catering establishments when they don’t eat or drink, and Whitmer was captured in a video doing neither while some of her companions were adhering to the anti-pandemic rules, according to the Washington Free Beacon.
"Governor Whitmer broke her own rule? That would be shocking except that we've seen this movie before," Fox News contributor Joe Concha told Fox News Digital. "This is the same governor who implored residents in her state not to travel to Florida earlier this year because of COVID. Only for her to take a private jet to the Sunshine State. She only apologized after she got caught."
The governor is known for having a record of violating COVID-19 policies. Earlier in May, she had to apologize for ignoring social distancing rules while dining with her friends in Michigan.
"Yesterday, I went with friends to a local restaurant," Whitmer said in a statement at the time. "As more people arrived, the tables were pushed together. Because we were all vaccinated, we didn’t stop to think about it. In retrospect, I should have thought about it. I am human. I made a mistake, and I apologize."
Whitmer, meanwhile, has implemented harsh pandemic restrictions, introducing lockdowns that negatively affected small “non-essential” businesses while allowing marijuana dispensaries to operate. Her mask mandate was accompanied by a $500 fine for circulating without a face covering and companies risked losing their licenses for not complying with the rules.