Gov. Andy Beshear issued an emergency order Thursday requiring Kentuckians to wear face coverings in public to prevent a growing spread of the coronavirus.
“You can think there’s some liberty component, but that ends when you put the health and safety of someone else at risk,” Beshear said near the end of a Capitol-rotunda briefing at which he announced and explained his decision.
He said he acted because of an increase in cases (with 333 more reported in the state Thursday, its seven-day rolling average spiked to 315 from 211 in just six days) and “watching what happens when people didn’t act quickly enough across the country.”
He compared Kentucky to Arizona, which had a similar number of daily cases two months ago but is now running out of hospital beds. “That’s what happens when this virus gets away from you,” he said. “We can’t wait until we are getting thousands a day.”
COVID-19 hospitalizations and intensive-care cases in Kentucky remained steady Thursday, but recent increases have left only 26 percent of ICU beds available, and “They can get eaten up real quickly if you let your covid numbers get away from you,” the governor said.
Beshear said he would appeal to overturn a temporary restraining order from Scott Circuit Judge Brian Privett telling him not to issue or enforce any more emergency orders unless he states “the emergency that requires the order, the location of the emergency, and the name of the local emergency management agency that has determined that the emergency is beyond its capabilities.”
Privett issued the order in a lawsuit filed by Evans Orchard & Cider Mill of Georgetown, seeking relief from Beshear’s limits on attendance at the agritourism facility. The injunction bars Beshear from enforcing any emergency order against the business “or any of the 547 other such registered facilities.
Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who joined the lawsuit, announced the ruling in a press release: “The governor cannot issue broad, arbitrary executive orders apart from the requirements of state law. … This is a clear win for the rule of law and will help Kentucky families and businesses across the commonwealth who have suffered and continue to suffer financial losses and economic hardship because of the governor’s executive orders.”
Beshear said the order from “Judge Whatshisname” was “absolutely irresponsible,” and he also lit into Cameron: “This shouldn’t be political, and it all seems to be; the attorney general in Kentucky is the only AG in the country suing the governor over these restrictions.”
After Beshear’s briefing, Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles issued a release saying in part, “The process has not treated everyone the same. Why do well-connected amusement parks with lobbyists get to talk to the government, but mom-and-pops get ignored?”
