Mark Steyn, a conservative media personality and frequent fixture on Fox News, on Tuesday blamed San Francisco’s gay community for the drastic measures imposed on the city due to the coronavirus pandemic.
San Francisco Mayor London Breed told residents this week to shelter-in-place to slow the spread of COVID-19, the infectious respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus.
Mr. Steyn subsequently offered an explanation for the unprecedented lockdown Tuesday while guest hosting the radio program normally presented by fellow conservative Rush Limbaugh. His comments were first reported by the Media Matters for American watchdog group.
“Why is San Francisco the first to do that? Because they’ve got all the gay guys there. It’s a big gay town, San Francisco, and they’re the ones with all the compromised immune systems from all the protease inhibitors and all the other stuff. And they don’t want all the gays dropping dead on the San Francisco mayor’s watch. So that’s why they’ve got all that sheltering in place there,” Mr. Steyn said during the “Rush Limbaugh Show.”
“And even if it dropped, they all dropped dead on the San Francisco mayor’s watch, if there was a big gay apocalypse, you know, the way this thing is going now, it would be [President] Trump who would get blamed for it anyway. He’d be — it would be his homophobia that would have struck down all these people in San Francisco. So that’s why they’ve all been ordered to stay home. And it’s not easy staying home,” Mr. Steyn said.
Ms. Breed, a Democrat, ordered San Franciscans on Monday to shelter-in-place effective Tuesday morning, as did officials in five neighboring counties across the greater Bay Area.
Slated to last until April 7, the measures apply to roughly 6.7 million residents of San Francisco, Santa Clara, San Mateo, Marin, Contra Costa, Sonoma and Alameda counties who are being asked to stay inside their homes except under limited circumstances. Non-essential businesses have been ordered closed, and practically all public and private gatherings occurring outside of a single family or living unit are prohibited.
“We know these measures will significantly disrupt people’s day-to-day lives, but they are absolutely necessary,” Ms. Breed said Tuesday. “This is going to be a defining moment for our city, and we all have a responsibility to do our part to protect our neighbors and slow the spread of this virus by staying at home unless it is absolutely essential to go outside.”
Mr. Steyn, 60, has regularly filled-in for Mr. Limbaugh to host the latter’s nationally syndicated radio show. He also appears frequently on Fox News, where he has previously guest-hosted the prime-time opinion program normally presented by fellow conservative commentator Tucker Carlson.
More than 7,000 cases of COVID-19 have been documented in the U.S. since Jan. 20. As of Wednesday, the nationwide death toll from the disease surpassed 100.
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