When President Joe Biden met with U.S. governors at the White House on Monday, he was the only one given a glass of water.
The message was clear — no one else is to remove their mask, even to take a drink.
The president was seated more than 10 feet from everyone, including Vice President Kamala Harris and members of his Cabinet.
Any White House staffer who was wearing a surgical mask when Biden entered the room were quickly handed an upgraded N95 version.
These are just some of the extraordinary efforts on the part of the White House to keep the president from getting COVID-19, even though he’s gotten both of his regular vaccinations and his booster.
It’s no surprise that steps are taken to protect any president. But the incredibly strict precautions could also threaten to undercut the Biden administration’s own efforts to tell Americans — especially those who are vaccinated and boosted — to move on with life after months of fear.
And it’s emblematic of the messaging challenges surrounding the administration’s approach to COVID-19 as the virus becomes endemic, familiar, and somewhat controlled… despite hard-to-follow health guidelines that change and are often unevenly implemented.
Biden aides also worry that the people who are most protected against COVID-19 remain locked down, a dynamic they view as a drag on the nation’s economic and psychological recovery.
When the highly transmissible omicron variant crashed into America and killed scores, Biden said it was a “cause for concern, not cause for panic.”
In recent weeks, his aides and science advisers have highlighted studies that show the strong protection offered by the COVID vaccines against the variant and reassuring vaccinated people they can go about their daily lives. Former President Donald Trump has also encouraged supporters to talk to their personal care physician about the vaccines, which were developed under his administration.
Since even before Biden was elected, his aides have made an extraordinary effort to shelter the now-79-year-old president from potential infection. He spent much of the 2020 campaign season holding remote events from a studio in the basement of his home, venturing out for travel in a bubble of frequently tested aides subject to an array of restrictions.
That extreme caution continued well after he was fully vaccinated and living at the White House.
As the nation’s virus response and vaccination campaign has become increasingly politicized, White House officials have expressed both political and policy concerns over a possible Biden infection. Though the vaccines are highly effective, breakthrough cases are increasingly common.
An infected Biden could erode public confidence in the shots and be used as a political cudgel against a president who was elected to bring an end to the pandemic.
Biden himself has at times taken a more relaxed approach to restrictions.
When the CDC last May surprised the White House by easing its guidelines on indoor mask-wearing by fully vaccinated individuals, Biden sought to publicly model the policy for the rest of the nation. He was meeting with vaccinated Republican lawmakers when the change was announced and led the group in removing their masks.
But that CDC guidance was later reversed over the summer, because vaccinated people could still transmit the virus, potentially endangering the tens of millions of Americans who are still unvaccinated.
When the delta strain surged last fall, the White House strengthened its testing protocols for everyone close to Biden — restrictions that had been lessened once aides were fully vaccinated and case counts began to fall nationally. In-person meetings were once again curtailed. Aides began increasing the distance between Biden and even vaccinated-and-tested individuals as a precaution, reminiscent of his earliest days in office.
In early January, as the nation’s capital led the country in per capita COVID-19 cases, White House press secretary Jen Psaki highlighted the “very strict precautions” taken to keep Biden and Harris safe, including mandatory mask-wearing and daily testing for those coming in contact with them.
She also claimed the White House had taken to limiting gatherings “to under 30 people.” But there were nearly 40 participants named by the administration — as well as two dozen members of the press — at Biden’s Monday meeting with the governors.
Psaki said the administration takes extra precautions any time the president removes his mask to speak to a group. She acknowledged that the nation continues to set records in reported cases, hospital admissions, and deaths.
“The president’s view is that right now we still need to keep our heads down and stay at it to fight what is still surging in parts of the country,” she said. “But we do have the tools to get to a point where it does not disrupt our daily lives.”
According to insiders, Biden has chafed at some of the extreme precautions his staff has implemented, saying that he wants to “get out of this place [the White House] more often.”
He’s hardly alone in his impatience.
On Monday, seated across a large gap from Biden in the East Room, Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, the chair of the governors’ association, appealed for the government to more clearly define a pathway out of the pandemic.
“We need the CDC to help us to have the right standards to end this pandemic and move to more endemic status,” he said. “We want to go from today to more normal.”
The night before, the president and first lady Jill Biden did attend the black-tie National Governors Association dinner at Mount Vernon.
Biden spoke but left before dinner.
The Associated Press contributed to this article