{"id":14761,"date":"2020-04-22T12:18:33","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T12:18:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/uncategorized\/2020\/04\/22\/congressman-asks-commandant-to-relax-grooming-standards\/"},"modified":"2026-08-08T20:34:54","modified_gmt":"2026-08-08T20:34:54","slug":"congressman-asks-commandant-to-relax-grooming-standards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/one.sightlinemg.com\/marinecorpstimes\/news\/coronavirus\/2020\/04\/22\/congressman-asks-commandant-to-relax-grooming-standards\/","title":{"rendered":"Congressman asks commandant to relax grooming standards"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A Maryland congressman sent a letter to the top Marine Tuesday asking the Corps to relax grooming standards<\/a> in the wake of videos showing Marines standing in long lines waiting for haircuts as COVID-19 continues to spread across the country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., urged Commandant of the Marine Corps Gen. David Berger to \u201cconsider temporarily relaxing grooming standards<\/a>” across the Corps to protect barbers, hairdressers and Marines due to COVID-19 concerns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raskin said the haircut policy has been raised with his office by a number of concerned Marine families. Raskin said he believed the families had a \u201ccompelling point\u201d to relax grooming standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt a time when social distancing has been imposed across the country and proven to be a successful public health measure, Marines are unnecessarily being put at risk of infection in order to comply with traditional grooming standards that may be optimal in an ideal world but are inessential and can be relaxed in the real world without doing any damage at all to institutional mission or national security,\u201d Raskin wrote in the letter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raskin noted in the letter that civilian barbershops have already been shuttered to help reduce the spread of the virus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raskin also detailed that large groups of Marines have been \u201croutinely observed congregating” around base barbershops waiting to get haircuts \u2014 going against public health guidelines that reccomended people not to gather in crowds larger than 10.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe key problem is the necessary physical proximity of barbers and their client, an obvious and extended violation of the six-foot social distancing advice recommended by the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention],\u201d Raskin wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt would only take one infected Marine sitting down in a barber chair, or one infected barber breathing too close to a client, to start a chain reaction that could infect a large population that forms part of our fighting force,\u201d Raskin wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\t