Our newly minted U.S. Senator Thom Tillis has found himself at the center of a viral video today, thanks to his comments at a policy forum that he'd be OK with cutting government regulations that might require restaurant employees to wash their hands after using the bathroom.
He said so in the course of speaking out against what he believes to be an over-regulated American society. He said he'd be fine with allowing restaurants to opt out of such regulations, provided they post a sign saying that their employees don't wash their hands after going to the bathroom. That, he added, would allow market forces to dictate the matter rather than government, as such restaurants would quickly go out of business for lack of customers.
It's in keeping with his small-government political philosophy. But even with the context, it still sounds awful weird for anybody to speak up against rules forcing handwashing by restaurant workers. (It appears he's talking about Section 2-301.14(B) of the N.C. Food Code Manual, if you care to get technical about it). It's pretty understandable that the host of the chat, held earlier this week at the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, takes a humorous jab at him by winding up their chat with, "Well, I'm not sure I'm going to shake your hand..." before thanking him for his time and -- yes -- shaking his hand.
Thanks for your thoughts on that, Thom. If it's all the same, we'll stick with the mandatory hand-washing rules. We're pretty sure restaurants can survive them.
--Eric Frazier
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