Like Charles Cooke, I don’t understand why she’d apologize for going maskless around masked kids when she assured us a few days ago that she’d done nothing wrong — and that it was borderline racist to suggest otherwise.

She agrees with the principle articulated by Trump and DeSantis that one should never apologize insincerely simply to wriggle out of a PR jam, doesn’t she?

You can skip this clip and read the transcript below for the key part of her comments if you like but then you’d miss the entertainment of watching Abrams babble through one of the funnier non-answers delivered by a politician recently.

New scene. Abrams to @ErinBurnett: “I apologize”pic.twitter.com/wrxpByFBC7

— Alex Thompson (@AlexThomp) February 9, 2022

She doesn’t need to apologize for going unmasked at a moment when COVID cases are in freefall in her home state and when she’s presumably triple-vaxxed. She’s earned the right to make her own risk assessment at this point. She does need to apologize for not defending the right of kids, who are at lower risk of severe illness than most vaccinated adults, to do the same.

But she can’t. Abrams is facing the same political dilemma that other top Democrats are, trying to woo swing voters by relaxing precautions while somehow not pissing off their base of liberals, who range from reluctant to hostile towards that idea, by doing so. Which is how we ended up with this highwire act from the clip:

COVID hygiene is going to be a point of debate for a very long time and we can only follow the science and follow our circumstances. Unfortunately in Georgia, we’re not in a place where that conversation is ready because we have one of the lowest vaccination rates in the country. We have 40 percent of our counties without general pediatricians. And we refuse to expand Medicaid, so so many families don’t having access to health care.

I believe our job is to protect children. And I know that educators and parents have to balance protection and education and that is a complicated issue. I think each governor has to evaluate what’s happening where they are. We have to look to the CDC.

But we also have to recognize that we are shifting from pandemic to endemic. Some states are going to get there faster than others.

My responsibility if I am lucky enough to be the next governor of Georgia is to look at the science, to follow the protocols, and to set the right example. And right now, that example is that we wear masks whenever possible. But we recognize that we can’t be a hard line about this, because situations change and we have different moments where we have to make decisions.

But in this instance, I would say that as the governor of Georgia, my job will be at that time to look at the science, to look at the situation, and to make the best decision to protect our kids.

To sum up: We’re not ready to drop mandates for kids but it’s up to the CDC but also COVID is entering the endemic phase and situations change but also it’s a complicated question.

Which I suppose boils down to “Mask indefinitely until further notice.” Maybe someday, decades from now when Georgia expands Medicaid, the moment will arrive.

Is that going to cut it with Georgia suburbanites? Brian Kemp thinks not:

Say no to pandemic politics.

Text "HYPOCRITE" to 43021! pic.twitter.com/HzaE20I3Xj

— Brian Kemp (@BrianKempGA) February 9, 2022

Sean Patrick Maloney, the head of the DCCC, also doesn’t think so. He’s pushing the same line that Hakeem Jeffries did yesterday, that it is time to began easing restrictions — all thanks to Joe Biden and the Democratic Party:

Democrats' plan to fight COVID is working – cases are down & vaccines are widely available. Now, it's time to give people their lives back.

With science as our guide, we're ready to start getting back to normal. https://t.co/ws1VCIIEy2

— Sean Patrick Maloney (@RepSeanMaloney) February 9, 2022

“People are sick to death of this pandemic,” said Maloney at a presser yesterday. “We will be in a position to communicate a clear off-ramp and to make sure people understand that they will be in a position to care for themselves and their families, that we trust parents to know best for their child and their schools.” Josh Kraushaar is right: He sounds like Glenn Youngkin there. As more Democrats — and the president? — begin swinging around to the same position, I wonder how long it’ll be before Abrams also decides that “the situation” in Georgia has changed sufficiently to make masks optional for students.

What she really wants, and what we may get at today’s White House briefing, is political cover from the CDC to drop mandates. If she can blame “the science” for ending restrictions, she can blunt the political backlash from forever-pandemic types on the left. Don’t blame me, she’ll tell them. Blame Rochelle Walensky.

One note in closing, though. Is it really true that there’s been a sea change among Americans towards loosening restrictions? This Monmouth poll was published 10 days ago.

Some lefties are grumbling that the sudden turn against mandates among Democrats is a case of the party establishment believing they’re in the minority on an issue when in fact they’re in the majority and simply pitted against a very loud minority. Could be. But between the election results in Virginia and the great likelihood that COVID cases are about to fall to new lows post-Omicron, Dems should want to start building their “back to normal” brand as far in advance of the midterms as they can. They’re anticipating a sea change in opinion, and reasonably so.

But even if opinion on mandates looks similar three months from now to how it looks in Monmouth’s poll today, Democrats still have political reasons to relax mandates. One is that signals from the party leadership that it’s time to ease back towards normalcy will surely soften opposition among rank-and-file Dems. Some of the forever-maskers will need a “permission structure” to side with anti-restriction Republicans, and Biden, Jeffries, Maloney and the rest are positioned to supply it. Also, a loud and passionate minority can and does often steer national policy despite opposition from a more ambivalent majority for the simple reason that people who are heavily invested in an issue are more likely to have their votes turn on it. Look no further than gun control, where a not-very-passionate majority routinely favors tightening laws while a fierce minority vows to oust any politician who agrees to do so. It must be the case by now, after two years of national COVID fatigue, that anti-maskers are more passionate about seeing restrictions rolled back than pro-maskers are about keeping them in place indefinitely. That’s what Biden et al. are worried about. Particularly within the cohort of swing voters.