Gov. Hochul’s push to restrict masking on the subway faces legal and public health concerns
on New York City subways has once again thrust her into controversy around the transit system — this time over a policy that potentially runs up against public health and free speech concernsHochul this week raised the idea of outlawing some kinds of face coverings that can allow people to hide their identities while committing criminal or threatening activities, after videosshowing a group of protesters from a pro-Palestinian rally who entered a subway car and demanded that “Zionists” leave...
If implemented, Hochul’s partial mask ban would mark a return to a pre-pandemic statute in New York that prohibited face coverings as part of an anti-loitering law that was repealed in the wake of COVID-19. On Friday, Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine said he was also concerned about the use of masks by bad actors at protests. He is among a number of elected officials who have both expressed alarm at the rise of antisemitism and been outspoken about public health issues, especially COVID-19.
“The evidence on medical-grade masks as a strategy for people to protect themselves and others from respiratory infections is really clear,” said Denis Nash, an epidemiology professor at CUNY. But any effort to bring back an anti-masking law could be a legal minefield, according to Norman Siegel, an attorney who spent years challenging the state’s old law. Hochul and state lawmakers would have to carefully craft legislation on a mask ban for it to have any chance of passing constitutional muster, he said.
The NYCLU argued that the law violated the right to anonymous and symbolic speech. A midlevel appeals court disagreed, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up the case.
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