COVID lies spread at Sacramento County meetings are an inside job. Are you OK with this?
.JPG "Sacramento County Supervisor Sue Frost is surrounded by a transparent screen as she listens to public comment during the board’s meeting at the County Administration Building in downtown Sacramento on Aug. 24. Frost was the only supervisor who didn’t wear a mask at the meeting.")
Speaker after speaker screamed into the microphone for hours at the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors meeting last week about violations of their First Amendment rights. How a resolution in support of medically accurate facts violates the First Amendment remains a mystery, but the scene reached its zenith when a woman began praying over the supervisors.
“Lord God, I ask that you work through this board,” the woman intoned, maskless and hands raised to the sky. “I cast out anything evil out of every single one of you ... board members. I ask that God comes down and takes control of this situation.”
Tuesday’s chaotic meeting gave viewers and attendees an idea of the tension that must exist behind the dais. Board Chair Sue Frost was the conductor of the show, blithely allowing a litany of COVID deniers and anti-vaxxers to hurl abuse at her colleagues. To their credit, they sat there gamely for three hours while their faith, ability and professionalism were called into question.
The item at hand was a resolution effectively scolding Frost for not only allowing misinformation to run wild at these meetings but also actively spewing it. The official disavowal of COVID disinformation was a symbolic gesture, and as Supervisor Phil Serna said at the outset, it does not infringe on the free speech or personal beliefs of those attending the meetings. San Diego and Monterey counties recently adopted similar resolutions.
“To discredit the substance of this resolution is to call into question the expert opinion of those we’ve been trusting for months,” said Supervisor Serna, who introduced the resolution to the board.
The item passed with only Frost dissenting. To the uninitiated, it may have seemed like an unnecessary public rebuke of the board chair, but Frost’s irresponsibility forced the issue. She attends rallies linked to far-right organizations such as the Proud Boys and remains in violation of the county’s orders within the chambers by forgoing a mask. She is relegated to a plexiglass cone of shame constructed around her seat to protect her colleagues from her dangerous choices.
At the beginning of the comment period, Frost proclaimed that a member of the public would be allowed to jump the long line and speak first as he had “a busy practice” in Roseville that he needed to get back to. Apparently Dr. Michael Huang’s dubious practice is to recommend the antiparasitic ivermectin, vitamin D and a daily aspirin to people suffering from COVID. He has already been reported to the Placer-Nevada County Medical Society for unprofessional conduct and issuing falsified mask exemptions.
That Frost saw fit to give this man pride of place in the queue should tell you everything you need to know about her leadership.
Frost ought to be the person keeping order in the room, and yet she is the one who allows conspiracy theories and, frankly, medical malpractice to hold as much weight as the county’s public health experts. An indirect condemnation is the least her colleagues on the board could do to demonstrate their faith in the hardworking medical professionals attempting to save lives here.
