State Rep. Mooney on coronavirus shutdown: ‘We can’t just continue to pick winners and losers — We’ve got to get Main Street back to work’

As the Alabama legislature is sorting out budgets in the waning days of the 2020 session amid the coronavirus pandemic, questions remain as to when the state’s economy can get back to a degree of normalcy with the opening of businesses that still remained shuttered as a result of an order from Gov. Kay Ivey and State Health Officer Dr. Scott Harris.

State Rep. Arnold Mooney (R-Indian Springs) argues there remains to be a need to recognize the country’s foundational values at this stage of the pandemic. In the end, that means relying on individuals to make decisions so that their constitutional rights are not violated.

Thursday on Huntsville radio’s WVNN, Mooney argued the right course of action from this point forward was to get “Main Street” back to work, referring to small businesses, which he pointed out was a significant portion of the overall economy.

“What you’ve got to do is you’ve got to produce and provide to people what are public health standard — what are the standards that have been set out by the CDC,” he said. “Then you’ve got to let people make their decisions. I believe very much in our foundational values and our Constitution nationally, with our wonderful documents in the United States Constitution. We can’t trample on the rights that people have there. Quite frankly, I believe we have a right to pursue economic liberty, to be at work, and to do the things that are needed there. We have got to be careful that we don’t overreach trying to say that we’re trying to keep everybody safe when people can make, and should make the right decisions, and they willfully do things that are wrong, then there are consequences to them for doing that.”

“We can’t just continue to pick winners and losers,” he added. “We’ve got to get Main Street back to work. That’s the 65% of the state that’s small business. Big business is still at work. They’re doing fine. They’re doing what they need to do in their various areas. They’ve handled things. But these small businesses don’t have the capacity to have months of reserves in place.”

@Jeff_Poor is a graduate of Auburn University and the University of South Alabama, the editor of Breitbart TV, a columnist for Mobile’s Lagniappe Weekly and host of Huntsville’s “The Jeff Poor Show” from 2-5 p.m. on WVNN.