Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, who announced Monday she tested positive for coronavirus, said Georgia was “too aggressive" when it reopened from COVID-19 shutdowns in late April.
“I think we were too aggressive in opening up... numbers are surging. It was too aggressive, it was too soon and we’re paying for it, not just in Georgia but we’re paying for it across the country and people are paying with their lives,” Bottoms said Tuesday on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
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Bottoms told George Stephanopoulos that she has a “slight headache” but added that it wasn’t unusual during her allergy season.
“COVID-19 has literally hit home. I have had NO symptoms and have tested positive,” Bottoms, 50, wrote on Twitter Monday to announce her positive test.
“My husband literally slept from Thursday until yesterday, that’s what gave me some concern. I just have never seen him sleep that much, but he’s feeling better,” Bottoms told "GMA."
Stephanopoulos then asked, “Are you confident you’re going to be able to handle the city as you deal with corona?”
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“I am and, prayerfully, my symptoms won’t get any worse. What they told me is I have a low positive test, so it either means I’m on the way up or the way down. I don’t know which one, but they’ve told me to treat it as if I’m positive just in terms of quarantining and the things that are recommended that people do,” Bottoms said.
Bottoms’ state of Georgia saw 1,548 new coronavirus cases Monday and 18 deaths, for a total of 97,064 cases and 2,878 deaths.
Bottoms, rumored as a possible Democratic vice presidential contender for Joe Biden, has been publicly dealing with the fallout from numerous protests in her city after a Black man, Rayshard Brooks, was shot and killed by an Atlanta police officer.
Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms -- who announced Monday she tested positive for coronavirus – feels Georgia was “too aggressive" when the state reopened from COVID-19 shutdowns. (Photo by Paras Griffin/Getty Images for Essence)
She delivered an impassioned press conference Sunday night, issuing a full-throated call for citizens to stop "shooting each other up on our streets," after an 8-year-old girl was shot and killed on the Fourth of July near the Wendy’s where Brooks was shot.
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Stephanopoulos asked why Atlanta has seen a surge in crime and how she planned to stop it — and the mayor responded by blaming a combination of coronavirus, police brutality and President Trump.
“I think it’s just this perfect storm of distress in America, I think that people are obviously anxious and even angry about COVID-19. Loved ones are dying, people are losing their jobs, I think that there is a lot of frustration, a lot of angst... the rhetoric that comes out of the White House doesn’t help it at all,” Bottoms said. “It doesn’t give people much hope. It’s all converging together and we’re seeing much of it spill out onto the streets of Atlanta and we’re seeing it across the country.”
She said that the coronavirus pandemic and recent cases of police brutality have “come together in a violent way,” before noting that she doesn’t agree with Gov. Brian Kemp’s decision to issue a state of emergency following a surge in shootings throughout the July Fourth weekend that injured 31 people and killed five after weeks of violent crime and property destruction in Atlanta.
“The irony of that is that I asked Gov. Kemp to allow us to mandate masks in Atlanta and he said no,” Bottoms said. “But he has called in the National Guard without asking if we needed the National Guard.”
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Kemp’s declaration authorized the activation of 1,000 National Guard troops in order to “protect state property and patrol our streets."
Kemp famously decided to loosen coronavirus restrictions before other states, allowing businesses such as bowling alleys, gyms, tattoo parlors, spas, nail salons and movie theaters to start operating in late April, as most of the country remained shut down.
Fox News’ Morgan Phillips contributed to this report.
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