Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms angered residents who want the city reopened to stimulate the local economy.
The Mayor tweeted a text message from someone who called her a racial slur on Wednesday.
“With my daughter looking over my shoulder, I received this message on my phone.”
With my daughter looking over my shoulder, I received this message on my phone. I pray for you.
“Conscientious stupidity or sincere ignorance.”
~Martin Luther King, Jr. pic.twitter.com/dOimv9sdN3— Keisha Lance Bottoms (@KeishaBottoms) April 23, 2020
The text message included the n-word and said, “just shut up and RE-OPEN ATLANTA.”
The Mayor’s supporters rushed to defend her. “I’m so sorry for this hatred and malevolence. But I’m grateful that your leadership is saving lives,” one follower tweeted.
Bottoms defied Governor Brian Kemp who ordered some businesses in the state to reopen on Friday, April 24.
The governor’s order will allow gyms, bowling alleys, hair salons and some other indoor facilities to resume operations by Friday if they comply with social distancing requirements.
Mayor Bottoms, who was caught off guard by Kemp’s announcement, told MSNBC’s “MTP Daily” on Tuesday that she is aware that her powers don’t supersede Kemp’s as governor.
“But I do have the power of my voice,” the Democratic mayor said. “And I am using my voice to encourage people: Follow the data, look at the science, listen to the health care professionals and use your common sense.”
Mayor Bottoms voiced her opposition to Gov. Kemp on numerous news programs including CNN, MSNBC, and radio shows.
During an interview with MSNBC’s Chuck Todd, the Mayor criticized Kemp for reopening the state too soon.
Thanks to the Mayor’s personal stylist, her hair was coiffed to perfection. But she had a message for less fortunate women who haven’t seen the inside of a hair salon in over a month: “Stay home.”
“We need to, as government leaders, step up and give people an incentive to stay home,” Bottoms told Todd. “But there’s nothing essential about going to a [hair salon] in the middle of a pandemic.”
Kemp defended his decision to jumpstart the economy in Georgia and allow people to return to work.
“If people don’t want to open the gym, they don’t have to. But when you close somebody’s business down and take their livelihoods … I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.”
