Florida's new surgeon general has been accused of refusing to don a mask for a meeting with a state senator who is battling breast cancer - then telling her it was fun to do so.
Tina Polsky, the Florida senator, received a breast cancer diagnosis in August, and will soon begin radiation therapy.
She said she asked Joseph Ladapo to put on a face mask 'several times' earlier this week during a one-on-one meeting in her office, only for him to allegedly refuse.
'I told him I had a serious medical condition,' Polsky said, according to FloridaPolitics.com.
Tina Polsky (left), the Florida senator, received a breast cancer diagnosis in August, and is will soon begin radiation therapy. She said she asked Joseph Ladapo (right) to put on a face mask 'several times' earlier this week during a one-on-one meeting in her office
'I really wanted to interview him. I had a lot of good questions,' State Senator Tina Polsky, pictured. said. 'So that was unfortunate that I didn’t do it. But I felt really uncomfortable'
In a September 16 op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, the Joseph Ladapo (pictured) decried 'a zealous pursuit of public mask-wearing,' which he wrote 'has had, at best, a modest effect on viral transmissions'
She told the outlet that Ladapo offered to conduct the meeting outside the enclosed space, to which she responded: 'I don't want to go outside - I want you to sit in my office and talk to you.'
When Polsky asked the surgeon general why he was unwilling to wear a mask, she said he 'smile[d] and didn't answer' in response.'
'He's very smug,' she said. 'I told him several times "I have this very serious medical condition" and he said "that's OK" like it basically has nothing to do with what we were talking about.'
At that point, Polsky said she asked him to leave her office - but Ladapo made sure to get the last word in:
'Sometimes I try to reason with unreasonable people for fun,' Ladapo said as he let the room, according to Polsky.
'I really wanted to interview him. I had a lot of good questions,' Polsky said. 'So that was unfortunate that I didn’t do it. But I felt really
