April 20, 2020

With Trump’s Go-Ahead, Georgia Is Reopening

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Despite warnings from public health officials that reopening the economy too soon could lead to a spike in coronavirus cases, Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, announced Monday that gyms, hair and nail salons, and bowling alleys would open back up on Friday. Restaurants and movie theaters are slated to open the following Monday, April 27.

South Carolina and Tennessee have similarly relaxed restrictions on non-essential businesses, following a push from President Trump to allow some governors to reopen their states on or before May 1. Trump’s benchmarks for reopening recommend that states see steady declines in coronavirus cases for 14 days, that their hospital systems not be overwhelmed, and that they have robust testing available before reopening. Going into Monday, Georgia had seen five straight days of declines in new positives; the longterm trend is uncertain.

Dr. Anthony Fauci has cautioned against states reopening too quickly, telling the Associated Press, “I’ll guarantee you, once you start pulling back there will be infections.” He warned that without aggressive testing and contact tracing, case counts could skyrocket.

Meanwhile, 18,947 people in Georgia have tested positive for the coronavirus, and 733 people have died. As one Twitter user noted, Georgia’s schools are set to remain closed for the remainder of the school year.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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