Fox News anchor Jeanine Pirro used a news segment Wednesday on “The Five” to mock the government response to the East Coast smoke crisis, disparaging Democrats who have encouraged mask usage despite its obvious and proven safety benefits.
Pirro, pulling straight from the right-wing pandemic playbook, called some of the smoke mitigation efforts in Washington “mask insanity” in video you can watch above.
“While Americans choke on the smoke, the far left smells an opportunity,” Pirro began, beside video of an indecipherable gray screen presumably featuring a smoky landscape.
“The Five” then pulled up an Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweet addressing the likely future needs surrounding similar climate crisis with Pirro’s sarcastic tone on full blast.
“AOC thinks this is a great time to push her Green New Deal,” Pirro said. “She says that we must, quote, ‘Adapt our food systems, energy grids, infrastructure, and healthcare to prepare for what’s to come.’”
Washington reaction and efforts surrounding the smoke crisis were up next for Pirro.
“Other Democrats are pumping up climate hysteria and bringing back, you guessed it — mask insanity,” she said, before video rolled of U.S. Rep. Adriano Espaillat on the House floor, describing the magnitude of the wildfire problem while wearing a hospital-style mask and declaring, “I wear my mask in solidarity.”
“Climate change is not a hoax,” Espaillat said. “We’re not only seeing the haze from these fires, we’re also feeling it in our very own lungs.”
“The Five” then cut to video of Espaillat’s fellow New York lawmaker, Sen. Chuck Schumer, as the seeming fool’s errand continued.
“The work to protect our climate is far from over,” Schumer said on the Senate floor. “And we’re dangerously behind.”
Smoke from wildfires in Canada has drifted south this week across much of the eastern U.S., drawing warnings from public health officials and medical experts to stay inside — or if you have to be outside, to mask up. The fact Washington leaders were following suit seemed to go lost on Pirro.
Fox News producers served up White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre as the grand finale, with her contention climate change was “only getting worse.”
“This is why the president has made climate change a priority,” Jean-Pierre said. “This is why he’s taken the aggressive actions he’s taken — historic actions.”
Watch the full video at the top of this post.
