Florida governor's office says if school officials impose mask mandates, salaries could be withheld

Ron DeSantis.
(Image credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

After several Florida school districts said they won't be following Gov. Ron DeSantis' (R) executive order banning mask mandates on campuses, his office on Monday said the Florida Department of Education could withhold the salaries of those superintendents and school board members.

DeSantis said his order protects "parents' freedom to choose whether their children wear masks." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines state that at K-12 schools, people should wear masks indoors, and with Florida seeing a record surge in the number of new COVID-19 cases, several school districts have filed lawsuits against DeSantis' order or voted to have students wear masks, even if just for the first two weeks of classes.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.