State governors, Trump claimed, need to allow churches to reopen «right now, for this weekend.» He added that «if they don’t do it, I will override the governors.»
At a press conference Friday afternoon, President Trump announced that he would order churches reopened despite the coronavirus pandemic — something he almost certainly does not have the power to do.
State governors, Trump claimed, need to allow churches to reopen “right now, for this weekend.” He added that “if they don’t do it, I will override the governors.”
Trump angrily reads his statement about reopening places of worship and then leaves without answering questions pic.twitter.com/HiZH7AyJhO
Trump also reportedly ordered the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to release guidance for houses of worship seeking to reopen.
There have been several outbreaks of coronavirus that were traced back to church gatherings. In April, at least 70 infections were linked to a church in Sacramento, California. More recently, the CDC determined that “among 92 attendees at a rural Arkansas church during March 6-11, 35 (38%) developed laboratory-confirmed COVID-19, and three persons died.”
Although many governors have either ordered churches closed or restricted gatherings within churches, some governors have allowed places of worship to reopen. There have also been some court challenges to orders closing houses of faith, but the impact of these challenges, at least so far, has largely been marginal.
State governments, not the White House, have the primary responsibility to decide how their states will react to the pandemic.
Congress could theoretically override some decisions by state governors. The Constitution gives Congress the power to “regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states,” a provision which gives Congress broad authority to regulate the national economy and to remove obstacles to interstate trade.
