Devin Nunes Claims Homeless Are Like A 'Zombie Apocalypse' Amid Coronavirus

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) compared the homeless to zombies in a Fox News interview on Sunday, and claimed they may have extra protection from the novel coronavirus because they live outside.

“One of the positive things in all this is that if you’re outside in the outdoors, you’re social distancing,” he said. “We haven’t seen it run through homeless population at least that we know of yet.”

It’s not yet clear how impacted the homeless population has been, but they are considered a vulnerable group. California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) warned last month that up to 60,000 homeless people could be infected as he launched a $150 million effort to move them into hotels, trailers and other forms of housing. 

Nunes complained that he has “several thousand [homeless], just in my district,” and blamed laws that allow some drug offenders out of prison.

“I call it ‘zombie apocalypse’ because a lot of these people have done drugs for a long period of time,” he said. “You know, they’re just not well.”

Media Matters shared the video online:

Nunes has made a number of eyebrow-raising comments about the pandemic. Last month, as the number of cases grew and public health officials cautioned against public gatherings, Nunes said it was “a great time to just go out, go to a local restaurant ” and suggested visiting “your local pub.” And last week, he called California’s decision to cancel in-classroom education  for the rest of the school year “overkill .”