Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms to defy Kemp ban on mask mandates

Several Georgia mayors including Keisha Lance Bottoms have lashed out over Gov. Brian Kemp’s (R) Wednesday order overriding local mandates requiring residents to wear a mask or face covering amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, vowing to continue enforcing local rules.

Bottoms said in a Thursday news conference that “it’s my belief that the city of Atlanta still has the appropriate standing to mandate masks,” specifically citing city-owned buildings and other areas.

"I believe that our city mask ordinance, and I believe those across the state, are defensible, and it is not just my posture but the posture of many mayors across this state that our policies are enforceable and they stand,” Bottoms said Thursday.

Kemp’s office has called local mask mandates “unenforceable.” The governor’s Wednesday order voids local mandates and instead “strongly” encourages all residents and visitors to wear face coverings in public.

When asked if she feared a lawsuit from the state, Bottoms, who announced that she tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this month, said she was not concerned .

"You all know I love to quote Audre Lorde, she says 'I am deliberate and afraid of nothing.' So I am not afraid of the city being sued," Bottoms said Thursday. "And I'll put our policies up against anyone's any day of the week."

[SOURCE: THE HILL]

Barack Obama: Trump's coronavirus response has been an 'absolute chaotic disaster

Former President Obama during a private call on Friday night with his former aides tore into the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus crisis, calling it an “absolute chaotic disaster.”

The blistering assessment, confirmed to CNN by three former Obama administration officials, came on a call intended to encourage members of the Obama Alumni Association to engage with former Vice President Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign.

"This election that's coming up — on every level — is so important because what we're going to be battling is not just a particular individual or a political party," Obama said, according to CNN. "What we're fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided and seeing others as an enemy — that has become a stronger impulse in American life."

Obama continued to tear into the Trump administration’s handling of the coronavirus crisis, partly blaming the White House’s "what’s in it for me" mindset.

"It's part of the reason why the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty," Obama said. "It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset of 'what's in it for me' and 'to heck with everybody else' ... is operationalized in our government."

[SOURCE: THE HILL]

Players Coalition and NFL donate $3M to black communities hit by coronavirus

The Players Coalition, an organization made up of former and current NFL players, donated $3 million to black communities affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

The majority of Coalition members are black, and many of them already had experience in local activism and advocacy through their work on issues ranging from encouraging children to stay in school to police shootings of unarmed black men.

“We were not trying to reinvent the wheel,” Beachum, a free agent offensive lineman said. “We have a number of guys across the nation and we pinged them: ‘Hey what are the various grassroot organizations that you know are doing the real work?’ We wanted to add to or supplement what they are doing.”

“We’re football players,” he added. “We can’t go in, put on a mask and save a life right now.” But the coalition is able to help “those who are saving the lives, in the emergency rooms, in need of beds, etc.,” Beachum said.

The group asked members to figure out which groups already doing community work would benefit from help, and then sent funds to hard-hit neighborhoods in Atlanta, Detroit, Chicago, Baltimore, New York, Washington, D.C. and South Florida.

Black Americans have been particularly hard-hit by the virus, making up 30 percent of those hospitalized due to COVID-19 despite comprising 13 percent of the population. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has attributed this largely to racial disparities in the health care system.

“We have an opportunity to direct financial resources to the hardest hit populations,” NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement. “This pandemic is having a tragic effect on communities of color and through Inspire Change and our relationship with the Players Coalition, we are pleased to be able to help where we can."