Monmouth County Democrat: End School Mask Mandate Now

EATONTOWN, NJ — The Democratic state lawmaker who represents southern Monmouth County said he thinks New Jersey's school mask mandate "should have ended much earlier."

That would be state Sen. Vin Gopal, who represents New Jersey's 11th District in Trenton, including towns such as Eatontown, Tinton Falls, Ocean Township and Red Bank. Gopal is emerging as one of the few NJ Democrats to publicly disagree with Gov. Phil Murphy on masks.

"I think the mask mandate should have ended much earlier," Gopal told Patch.

When asked to define what he meant by "much," Gopal said "three weeks ago."

"I don't think it was necessary these past three weeks. I think (the school mask mandate) was necessary back when we had 30,000 cases a day and when we saw cases rising in omicron, 45 days ago. Cases and hospitalizations have really been down the past few weeks."

"I think people are tired of seeing politicians at parties, meeting their friends at restaurants without masks on and then putting mask mandates in place," he added. "There's a lot of frustration."

Murphy said the school mask mandate will end March 7, citing a continued decline in cases.

Gopal also just introduced a bill that would greatly limit the governor's power:

On Jan. 31, he and northern Monmouth County Republican state Senator Declan O'Scanlon introduced Senate bill S1200. The bill limits how much power a governor has in declaring — and governing — in a state of emergency. It would allow the state Legislature to terminate a public health emergency with a two-thirds vote, and it would allow a governor to only renew a state of emergency once. After that, every emergency extension would have to be approved by the Legislature.

That's not how Gov. Murphy has operated in the pandemic.

In the past two years, Murphy has extended the state of emergency 12 times, which gives him sweeping power to unilaterally issue executive orders, such as the rent moratorium and K-12 school mask mandate.

For months now, New Jersey Republicans have been howling.

"Look, I just want to be a prime sponsor of a bill that makes the Legislature a co-equal branch of government," Gopal said this week. "I think the governor should include the Legislature more often and we should be involved. It has less to do with Phil Murphy and more that we are a co-equal branch of government. If Chris Christie or anybody else was governor, I would introduce this bill. I also question how many of my Republican colleagues would have done this if Christie was in office."

While Gopal and O'Scanlon are the bill's prime sponsors, the bill has 14 co-sponsors, all Republicans. So far, Gopal is the only Democrat to back the bill.

Gopal is a moderate Democrat who represents a moderate district. He voted against $15-an-hour minimum wage, which became New Jersey law, and he voted against a tax on Jersey Shore house rentals, proposed by former leading Democrat Steve Sweeney, voted out last fall in favor of conservative truck driver Ed Durr.

Gopal himself very narrowly won re-election this past November; he beat a Republican challenger by a margin of only 2,600 votes. His District 11 Democratic running mates in the Assembly lost their seats to Republican newcomers.

In the 2021 governor's race, Jack Ciattarelli won Gopal's district. Gopal also pointed out that he personally received more votes than Murphy did in the 11th District. Here are the results of the 2021 election and governor's race in District 11:

• Ciattarelli (Republican): 37,379
• State Sen. Gopal (Democrat): 36,978
• Murphy (Democrat): 34,931
• Lori Annetta (Republican seeking the state Senate seat held by Gopal): 34,296

The Middletown school board said at their meeting this week they will be working much more closely with Sen. Gopal to try and secure funding for their district, as Gopal was just named chair of the Senate Education Committee. Middletown school board President Frank Capone, often a Murphy critic, tweeted this week that the school board will pass a resolution supporting Senate Bill S1200.

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