Video shows the moment a security guard forcibly dragged a New York father out of an upstate school board Tuesday night because he was not wearing a face mask.
The footage shows unmasked Dave Calus sitting in a chair as he watches a presentation at the Webster School Board meeting when the security guard approaches him.
The security guard reportedly tells Calus: ‘Sir, you need to put a mask on.’
Calus said he replied with ‘thank you,’ but the security guard persisted: ‘No, you need to put your mask on right now.’
The father said he thanked the guard again, but was met with another demand to put on a mask. The guard then grabbed the back of Calus’ chair, dragged him backwards across the floor and yanked him out of his jacket, forcing him to stand.
Calus turned to face the guard, who is pointing to the door, before sitting back down in his chair.
The guard – seemingly angry – grabs the chair, placing one hand under the seat and the other on the back as he tips the chair over. The guard then pushes the father-of-two out of the room as bystanders yell: ‘What are you doing?! What are you doing?! That’s assault!’
Another questioned: ‘Do you put your hands on our children, too?’
Calus was removed from the meeting and taken to urgent care for evaluation. He said Wednesday, speaking exclusively on Kimberly’s Revolution podcast, he was a ‘little sore’ after the incident but otherwise ok.
The alleged assault at the Webster School Board meeting occurred just one day before Governor Kathy Hochul announced she was letting the statewide indoor mask mandate – which was slated to expire Wednesday – lapse. The governor cited New York’s 93 percent drop in COVID-19 cases and declining hospitalization rates as the reasoning behind her decision.
The mask mandate will remain in effect at state-regulated facilities including schools, health care facilities, adult care facilities and nursing homes, correctional facilities, childcare centers, homeless shelters, domestic violence shelters and on public transit. All other businesses, including shops, movie theaters, gyms/fitness centers and restaurants, are no longer ordered to require masks but can do so if they choose.
The governor said she will review the school order – which has prompted outrage amongst students, parents and politicians – next month after students return to the classroom following their upcoming midwinter break.
Dave Calus was forcibly dragged out of the Webster School Board Meeting on Tuesday night after he refused to wear a face mask. The security guard yanked his chair, attempting to force him out of the room
After being forced out of his seat, Calus turned to face the guard, who is pointing to the door, before sitting back down in his chair. This prompted the guard to begin another removal attempt
Dave Calus told the podcast he was approached by the guard while a first-grader was giving a presentation, noting he was ‘sitting peacefully’.
The father, who has one son in high school and another in college, claims the incident was unprovoked.
‘I want into the building without a mask on. I signed in and they said “you need to wear a mask,”‘ he recalled. ‘I said “thank you.”‘
‘I signed in, they handed me a mask – I did not put the mask on – and I put it in my pocket.’
Calus claims he proceeded to the board room, where he was met by staff who told him if he didn’t wear a mask he would be placed in isolation during the meeting.
‘They were segregating masked and unmasked parents,’ he explained. ‘The unmasked parents were going to have to sit in a classroom with a video monitoring watching and listening to the board meeting.’
He said he placed in the classroom and decided ‘this isn’t going to work for me’. Calus walked down to the main board room and was once again instructed to wear a mask.
‘I took a mask from the person who handed it to me, looped it around my ear, walked into the room, and sat down and put the mask in my pocket,’ he recalled.
He said he remained seated for 15 to 20 minutes before being approached by the security guard.
Calus also alleged the security guard pushed another maskless attendee – a woman he claimed was ‘very active, very intelligent and very important’ to their fight against mandates – and ‘put his hand on his back’ and ‘forced her out of the room’.
‘I had heard him going up to other people behind where I was sitting, telling other people “You need to wear a mask, you need to wear a mask, you need to wear a mask,”‘ Calus said, sharing how he wasn’t shocked by the encounter.
‘So I knew it was just a matter of time before he got me.’
Webster Police Department, issuing a statement on Facebook, said their officers were not involved in the incident but they are conducting an investigation. After the investigation is complete, the department will determine whether ‘charges are appropriate’.
Calus (pictured) was attending the meeting to speak out against the school mask mandate
The guard – seemingly angry – grabbed Calus’ chair, placing one hand under the seat and the other on the back as he tips the chair over. The guard then pushes the father-of-two out of the room as bystanders yell: ‘What are you doing?! What are you doing?! That’s assault!’. He was removed from the meeting and taken to urgent care for evaluation. He said Wednesday that he was a ‘little sore’ after the incident but otherwise ok
Calus had attended the Webster School Board meeting with plans to speak out about the school mask mandate. He had voiced his concerns before at a board meeting last summer.
‘My concern today, still – as it was last June when I spoke at the board meeting – is the consistent mask mandates in the schools,’ he told the podcast.
‘They are effecting the kids in mental and emotional ways that are … not detectable right now.’
He argued that although there are ‘people who care’ at the school, he doesn’t believe administrators are doing anything to help the kids.
Calus shared his high school aged son only wears a mask while in school and claims the ‘last two years have taken his voice away from him’.
‘I am absolutely an advocate [for my son],’ Calus shared. ‘The mask mandates are the precursor to allowing the state and the department of health to mandate vaccines on kids in the schools.’
‘We need choice. We need a choice to send them to school with a mask and without a mask. We need the freedom to choose whether they get a vaccine or not.’
The school board incident came just one day Governor Kathy Hochul announced she was letting the statewide indoor mask mandate – which was slated to expire Wednesday – lapse due to the decline in COVID cases. On Thursday, NY reported a 92% drop in cases positivity
The New Yorker’s concerns are echoed across the nation as parents and students fight to have school mask mandates repealed.
Officials in Connecticut, Delaware, New Jersey and Oregon recently announced plans to lift mask mandates for schools and other public places as they seek a return to ‘normalcy.’
Meanwhile, governors in California, Illinois and New York are lifting indoor masking requirements, but extending the requirement for schools.
Hochul argued Wednesday that New York was ‘trending in a very, very good direction’ – citing case and hospitalization rates – and is ‘now approaching a new phase in this pandemic.’
‘We are not where we were in early December. New Yorkers did the right thing to get through the winter surge, and we can now lift the statewide mask-or-vaccine requirement for indoor businesses starting tomorrow,’ she said, adding: ‘Counties, cities and businesses can still choose to require masks.’
New York reported just over 7,422 new positive coronavirus cases on Thursday, a nearly 92 percent decline from the 90,000 that tested positive about a month ago.
Covid cases are dropping over the past two weeks in all 50 states, and northeastern states like Connecticut and New York in particular are posting massive falls of around 70% each
The U.S. is recording 223,417 infections daily, a 43 percent drop from 394,741 cases per day this time last week
How school mask mandates vary state-by-state
School mask mandates, like other pandemic restrictions, vary by state.
School mask mandates are in effect in California, DC, Hawaii, Illinois, New Mexico, Rhode Island and Washington.
Last month, Massachusetts extended its mandate through February. It remains unclear if the mandate will be extended again.
New York Gov. Hochul announced February 9 that she will reevaluate the school mask mandate in March.
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy announced February 7 that his state’s mandate will be lifted on March 7.
Delaware Gov. John Carney made a similar announcement February 7, saying the state’s school mask mandate will lift March 31. He also said the general statewide indoor masks order will end on February 11.
Connecticut is set to end its statewide mask mandate on February 28.
Oregon will lift its statewide mask mandate on March 31.
Maryland, which still has a school mask mandate in effect, now allows local districts to remove masks if 80 percent of students and staff at a single school are fully vaccinated or 80 percent of the district’s community population is fully vaccinated.
If neither of the vaccination thresholds are met, a local district can also choose to lift universal masking when the county or jurisdiction has reached 14 days of moderate or low transmission of COVID-19.
Louisiana and Pennsylvania have lifted their statewide school mandates.
Seven states – Arizona, Florida, Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas and Utah – currently has legislation in effect banning school mask mandates.
Updated: Feb. 9, 2022
The statewide positivity rate is now 3.62 percent, a decline from the 23.2 percent peak recorded at the start of 2022.
Additionally, hospitalizations have decreased to 4,398, a 63.5 percent drop from the 12,000 reported in mid-January.
Every single state in the U.S. is recording a drop in cases over the past two weeks. The drop offs have been massive as well, with 43 states having had cases slash in half over the past two weeks – and 21 recording a 70 percent fall.
The U.S. is recording 223,417 infections daily, a 43 percent drop from 394,741 cases per day this time last week.
‘Masks have been a successful part of our toolkit to fight COVID, and New Yorkers must keep wearing them in certain places throughout the state,’ Hochul said during Wednesday’s press conference.
The governor said she will revisit the school mask mandate come March, but said in the meantime officials are taking steps to mitigate the spread of COVID-19 ahead of midwinter break.
All K-12 students and their families will be provided a state issued ‘winter tool kit’ that involves sending children home with COVID testing kits ahead of the school recess. They will then be tested again upon return from break.
Hochul said officials will use this data to make further decisions about masking in classrooms.
The end of New York’s indoor mask mandates comes as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) declared it continues to stand by its mask-wearing guidelines for schools, saying COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are still ‘too high’ to consider dropping restrictions despite daily infections having declined by 47 percent over the past seven days.
‘Right now our CDC guidance has not changed. We continue to endorse universal masking in schools,’ CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said during a radio interview with WYPR on Tuesday. ‘We owe it to our children to make sure that they can safely stay in school. Right now, that includes masking. We’ve seen outbreaks that have occurred in communities where students were not masked in schools and had to close.’
The Biden administration doubled down on wearing face masks – even though eight Democratic governors have rolled back COVID restrictions, cases and hospitalizations have plummeted and one of America’s closest allies England has completely scrapped all rules.
‘Our guidance is consistently has consistently been this: when you are in a high transmission area, which is everywhere in the country, you should wear a mask and indoor settings, including schools,’ White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at her press briefing on Wednesday.
When asked if people should follow the current Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines, which are to wear a face covering, instead of listening to their governor, Psaki responded: ‘Yes.’
She conceded some people are tired of wearing masks but added there are many who still want to have one on.
‘People are tired of masks,’ Psaki said, adding, however, ‘there were also a huge chunk of people who still want masks.’
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