North Carolina Republicans Vote to Ban Masks in Public — Even for Cancer Patients

The North Carolina Senate voted along party lines to ban anyone wearing masks in public, even for health reasons.

Republican State Sen. Buck Newton, who sponsored the bill, said protesters are abusing pandemic norms to wear masks so that they can hide their identities.

The mask ban, which would effectively bring back a 1950s law meant to target the KKK, would help police identify protesters, according to its Republican supporters, who say police will be expected to use "common sense" not to use it to arrest "Granny in the Walmart," as Newton put it to reporters.

Newsweek reached out to the North Carolina State Senate for comment but did not hear back immediately.

In the 1950s, anti-mask laws were enacted in several states, including North Carolina, as a response to hate groups like the Ku Klux Klan, some of which have remained technically on the books for decades. In Louisiana and Minnesota, the laws made exceptions for religious face coverings. Other states, like Florida and California, made it an offense to wear a mask if the person commits or intends to commit a crime.

There were exceptions, however, that were expanded during the Covid-19 era to include people wearing masks for health reasons.

A woman shops for groceries while masked. A new North Carolina law could prevent state residents from wearing masks in public, no matter the reason A woman shops for groceries while masked. A new North Carolina law could prevent state residents from wearing masks in public, no matter the reason Helena Lopes/Getty Images, Canva Stock

Newton's bill would remove that exception.

"This bill is clearly in response to the recent protests on college campuses against Israel's military campaign in Gaza," Melissa Price Kromm, executive director of the grassroots group NC for the People Action, told NC Newsline. "Thus, it is another anti-protest bill."

Newton said the purpose of the law is to "deal with organizations and individuals who are intent on breaking the law and hiding their identity." He called the bill, H-237, "unmasking mobs and criminals."

The legislation , however, would ban masks for everyone, not just protesters. Newton pointed out there is no record of anyone being arrested in North Carolina prior to the pandemic for wearing a mask, even though it was technically illegal, WRAL reported.

Still, North Carolina Democrats slammed the bill as an example of Republican overreach.

Sen. Sydney Batch, a cancer survivor, said that having people wear masks around her was critical when she was immunocompromised during medical treatment.

"Someone walking around with tuberculosis, wants to wear a mask to protect everybody else is no longer able to do that based on this bill," Batch said.

Batch and her Democratic colleague, Sen. Lisa Grafstein, had suggested to amend the bill to protect people wearing masks for health concerns while allowing police to have the power to detain masked protesters.

Other Democratic state senators, like Natasha Marcus, said the bill was "a desire to score some political points with the anti-mask crowd during an election year, at the expense of vulnerable people."

Every Senate Democrat voted in opposition of the bill, while every Republican voted for it. The legislation passed 30-15 and now goes to Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat, who could veto it. However, North Carolina Republicans have a supermajority in the legislature which they could use to override the veto.

The legislation comes on the heels of multiple pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses across the country, where students and staff have often covered their faces with surgical and other types of face masks.

Demonstrations have been held at North Carolina's two most elite schools: the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where pro-Palestinian protesters removed an American flag, and Duke, where several dozen members of the graduating 2024 class recently boycotted Jerry Seinfeld's commencement address over his support of Israel.