NBC: We're fighting our own state': Southern mayors push back on state coronavirus response

PHIL MCCAUSLAND, NBC NEWS

When Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, announced Thursday that he was suing Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms over the city’s decision to enforce a mask mandate, he created another battleground in the ongoing struggle between states and cities over how to respond to the pandemic.

Bottoms on Friday called the lawsuit “bizarre” and said she believed it was clear that Kemp was motivated by his political ideology, rather than the leadership required in this moment. The governor's office disputed that characterization.

Yet Bottoms is just one of several Democratic city mayors in Republican-controlled Southern states to institute local mask mandates when they felt state political leadership was too slow in responding to coronavirus outbreaks — but localized guidance is not effective enough, mayors across the region said.

Mayors of large cities in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee and Georgia said their political counterparts at the state level are acting as though this is a local issue, not a global pandemic. They expressed frustration over the lack of coordination and consistent response provided by state leaders, all while the pandemic and basic precautions like wearing masks and social distancing have become politicized.

Because their jurisdictions are small and under-resourced, many mayors have said they feel unable to provide their constituents a full-throated response to defeat the virus. And even if they felt that they were empowered to make decisions, clearly not all Americans are willing to comply with orders.

“It is mind boggling that this governor who did not know that this virus was asymptomatic until we were well into the pandemic would waste resources on suing me personally and our city council for a mask mandate,” Bottoms said on MSNBC Friday.

Kemp's office said that the intention of the lawsuit is to challenge Bottom's decision to move the city back to Phase 1 of reopening, which requires people to shelter at home and restaurants to close dining rooms, though the lawsuit does also target Atlanta's mask mandate.

"While we all agree that wearing a mask is effective, I’m confident that Georgians don’t need a mandate to do the right thing,” Kemp said at a press conference that served as his first public remarks since becoming the country's only governor to openly attempt to block a local government mask ordinance.

Jackson, Mississippi, Mayor Chokwe Lumumba said the divide between the state and local government response is evident to him each day. The governor’s office has not provided leadership during the crisis, except to decide to reopen the economy completely at the end of May although the state's case count continued to trend upward, he said. Without state or federal leadership, Lumumba said, health protocols can change depending on what side of the street you’re walking on — because that’s how close some municipalities are to one another.

Gov. Tate Reeves, who did not respond when asked for comment, only ordered a mask mandate for 13 of the hardest hit counties in the state on Monday. Lumumba said the localized, patchwork response still isn’t enough.

While Lumumba had hoped to take a slow, phased approach, he said Jackson quickly became an island as the communities surrounding it went back to business as normal. State leaders haven’t provided significant help to its largest city and state capital, the mayor said, noting that Jackson is home to the state’s largest hospital system.

“When infection rates grow in the surrounding communities, then it's our hospitalization rates that are going to be impacted as well. It's our ventilators that will be utilized at a much higher level. And so that's another reason that we have been screaming out for partnership, screaming out for continuity — we're screaming out for an ability to share data.”

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