Governor Brian Kemp said the measure violates his emergency orders that prohibit local leaders from increasing the state’s requirements to protect against the coronavirus. The lawsuit intensifies a dispute between Kemp and Bottoms after she introduced an order that failing to wear a mask within city limits is punishable by a fine or up to six months in jail.
Kemp said the lawsuit was an attempt to support business owners as local leaders “undermine economic growth.”
But several mayors in the state have spoken out against the lawsuit, saying the mask mandates are backed by its residents.
‘We want a community that is safe’
Several mayors told CNN that Kemp’s order and the action he is taking to enforce it has prevented them from taking steps to protect their citizens.
“As I’ve always said, you have to have all three W. You have to wear a mask, you have to wash your hands, and you have to watch your distance,” Augusta Mayor Hardie Davis, Jr. told CNN’s Don Lemon on Thursday. “If we are going to prevent people from dying in the state of Georgia, these are things we have to do.”
Savannah Mayor Van Johnson told CNN’s Jake Tapper on Thursday that he felt the order added something else for cities to fight.
“Not only are we fighting coronavirus on the one hand, it appears we are fighting our state on the other hand,” Johnson said. “We are going to do what we can to protect the Savannahians … This is a fight for our lives.”
And while Kemp’s office argued that the mask-mandated order supports residents, some mayors said the public is calling for more restrictions.
“I am listening to one constituent after another saying, ‘Please keep the order of the mask. We want to be safe. We want a community that is safe,” Athens-Clark Mayor Kelly Girtz told CNN’s Chris Cuomo. .
Even companies benefit from the mandates, he argued, because they allow them to implement security measures uniformly.
“We want to make sure that if you are a small business or a national chain, you are equally safe,” he said. “Business people have asked me to create a level playing field as level as possible.”
‘It has nothing to do with politics’
Davis, Johnson, Girtz and Bottoms are Democrats who speak out against the policy implemented by a Republican governor, but say that the coronavirus and its precautions should not be political.
“What we cannot do is use executive orders to divide the state of Georgia and take an apolitical public health crisis and turn it into political football,” Davis said.
In fact, Republican leaders have signed restrictions to protect themselves against the spread of the virus, Girtz noted.
“Texas, Alabama, today we hear about Arkansas,” he said. “It is clear that there is a simple guide and science of health care that we should all follow across the political spectrum.”
Johnson said the governor’s orders are preventing local leaders from taking action against the virus, even when neighboring Alabama has ordered masks and Florida to the south is becoming the access point.
“It has nothing to do with politics. It is about protecting our people,” he said.
Veronica Stracqualursi and Paul LeBlanc of CNN contributed to this report.
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