Gov. Brian Kemp’s brutal week started with the threat of a protest at the Capitol urging him to lift coronavirus restrictions as he was planning to do just that. It ended with a cacophony of horns from a caravan of demonstrators outside the Governor’s Mansion who were furious he allowed more businesses to open.
In the days between, he drew bipartisan condemnation. Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms worried aloud on national television that he was willing to “sacrifice lives for the sake of the economy.” Health experts warned of dire consequences. And President Donald Trump, his most important ally, strongly rebuked him for two consecutive days…
“The moment people hear a bowling alley could reopen, they don’t look at his executive order,” said Buzz Brockway, a former Republican state legislator who is a policy wonk at the conservative-leaning Georgia Center for Opportunity. “There are a lot of restrictions, a lot of hoops you have to jump through.”