Georgia Governor Brian Kemp (R-GA) responded to Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms’ (D) assertion that rising crime in the state’s capital city is due to the reopening from COVID closures. Bottoms said that the state “opened up before the rest of the country, even before the CDC said that it was safe for us to open,” and argued that “we had people traveling here from across the country to party in our city.”
"Remember in Georgia we were opened up before the rest of the country, even before the CDC said that it was safe for us to open so our night clubs and our bars remained open so we had people traveling here from across the country and partying in our city," the mayor told MSNBC last week.
Kemp called Bottoms out for refusing to take responsibility for the spike in crime in her own city.
"According to the mayor, rising crime in our capital city is everyone’s fault but her’s. Getting Georgians back to work, back to school, and back to normal didn’t lead to more crime. The left’s anti-police, soft-on-crime agenda is to blame," Kemp wrote on Twitter.
While Bottoms shifts blame, Kemp is taking aim at the crime increase. He vowed that lawlessness “will not be tolerated.”
While Democrats and local leaders shift blame and refuse to take action against rising crime, we are using state resources to back law enforcement and put criminals behind bars.
— Brian Kemp (@BrianKempGA) June 21, 2021
We will not tolerate lawlessness on our streets and in our neighborhoods. Period. pic.twitter.com/qtL12f87f4
The mayor promised that her administration is "doing every single thing" possible to crack down on crime.
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