Cuomo Threatened To Sue ANYONE Trying To Quarantine Nasty NYC Superspreaders

CNN |  The struggle to contain the coronavirus pandemic is opening a new front in the long-running conflict between blue cities and red states. 

Across a wide array of states with Republican governors, many of the largest cities and counties -- most of them led by Democrats -- are moving aggressively to limit economic and social activity. State officials, meanwhile, are refusing to impose the strictest statewide standards to fight the virus.

 

A growing chorus of big-city officials in red states like Florida, Georgia, Mississippi and Missouri are now urging their governors to establish uniform statewide rules, arguing that refusing to do so undercuts their local initiatives by increasing the risk the disease will cluster in neighboring areas -- from which it can easily reinfect their populations.

 

On Tuesday afternoon, after weeks of complaints from local officials and medical officials, Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a statewide order restricting social interactions to essential activities (albeit with some conspicuous exceptions). 

 

Robyn Tannehill, the mayor of Oxford, Mississippi (home of the University of Mississippi), told me in an interview that the absence of a statewide rule was undercutting their local efforts to control social interaction.

 

"As we are a regional health care and shopping destination, we have people coming through from surrounding counties that are not [imposing] a stay at home order," she said. "When they come here, you don't know who you are passing in the Kroger or the Walmart. ... I think a statewide stay-at-home order is very necessary."

 

The Republican governors most resisting statewide action have almost all argued that smaller counties should not face the same restrictions as larger ones. "What may be right for places like the large urban areas may not be right at this particular point in time for the" smaller counties with fewer cases, Abbott said last week before relenting on Tuesday.

 

While echoing that logic, other GOP governors resisting calls for action from large cities have also cited more ideological arguments. Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves last week painted extensive shut-down orders as an expression of overly intrusive government. "In times such as these, you always have experts who believe they know best for everybody," he said. "You have some folks who think that government ought to take over everything in times of crisis — that they, as government officials, know better than individual citizens." 

 

Similarly, Missouri's GOP governor, Mike Parson, argued that rather than government action "it is going to be personal responsibility" that wins the struggle against the virus.