House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a strong advocate of mask-wearing mandates, is facing backlash on social media for hosting a lavish fundraising brunch in Napa Valley surrounded by unmasked donors.
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Video from Saturday's fundraiser show dozens of people sitting shoulder to shoulder at long tables, without masks and not following any social distancing protocols.
The only people wearing masks in the footage are waitstaff. It's unclear if any of the guests were required to show proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test.
The video was initially posted to Facebook by winemaker Kathryn Walt Hall and then shared on Twitter by New York Times reporter Kenneth P. Vogel.
The event is drawing ire as Napa County is designated as a "high" COVID-19 transmission area -- the most concerning designation by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Guidance from the CDC says people do not have to wear masks outdoors in general, though masks should be considered in areas with high numbers of COVID cases and for activities with close contact with others.
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"All the servants fully masked," journalist Glenn Greenwald tweeted. "The almost-entirely old, white, rich crowd of DCCC donors free to go maskless as they’re served."
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy tweeted that "Speaker Pelosi wants to lock you down again while she wines and dines with her political donors. It's utter hypocrisy."
Tickets for the ritzy event sold for between $100 and $29,000 with proceeds going to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the official campaign arm of Democrats in the House of Representatives.
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Not only is Pelosi catching heat for hosting such an event in a COVID-19 hotspot where no one was wearing a mask, but she's also being criticized for holding the lavish brunch while the Biden administration faces backlash amid the United States' chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan. President Joe Biden has repeatedly defended pulling troops out of the country, which fell to the Taliban over the course of 11 days.
Last month, Biden told reporters that a Taliban-takeover of Afghanistan was not likely. He and others in the administration are now saying they are shocked at how quickly the Afghan military surrendered.
Several thousand American citizens are still stranded in Afghanistan. The White House is coordinating further efforts to bring those people home, with a target of 5,000 to 9,000 daily evacuations. At least seven people have died amid chaos at the airport in the country's capital of Kabul.
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