Less than a week after Joe Biden’s presidential inauguration, California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) will be lifting widely criticized stay-at-home orders, allowing outdoor dining and salons to reopen again, according to a new report.
According to a letter from the California Restaurant Association, sources close to Gavin Newsom’s office have indicated the bans will be lifted in the Golden State as early as Monday.
“In a letter to restaurant owners, the California Restaurant Association says sources tell them that officials with Gov. Newsom’s office plan to lift the stay-at-home orders in all regions of the state on Monday,” reports ABC7. “Golden Gate Restaurant Association President Laurie Thomas says she’s ‘optimistic outdoor dining will resume by the end of the week.'”
In a statement to ABC7, a spokesperson for the governor’s office said the change in policy would be based on “promising signs.”
“We see promising signs that California is slowly emerging from the most intense stage of this pandemic. We continue to look at what that means for the Regional Stay at Home order and anticipate that the state Department of Public Health will provide a formal update tomorrow morning,” said the statement.
The full letter from California Restaurant Association reads:
Late this evening, senior officials in the Newsom administration informed us that the Governor will announce tomorrow that the stay-at-home order will be lifted in all regions of the state.
The regions of the state currently under the stay-at-home order are: Bay Area; Southern California; and San Joaquin Valley. Two other regions – Northern California and Sacramento region – are currently not under the stay-at-home order.
Again, a formal announcement is expected tomorrow and we will send you further information as soon as it’s available. For now, we thought you’d like to know this good news.
In addition to lifting the outdoor dining ban, Newsom is reportedly poised to allow salons to reopen. However, as noted by Politico, “county health officials could still try to impose their own restrictions” as a result of Newsom “allow[ing] local leaders to impose stricter rules than the state does.”
As The Daily Wire reported on Saturday, Newsom found himself at the center of another controversy when his administration said that they will not release COVID-19 data to avoid confusing residents.
“Newsom’s administration has been hiding COVID-19 data, saying that data is too complex for Californians to understand. The hidden data relates to how the California government projects intensive care unit (ICU) capacity,” said the report. “Just days before President Joe Biden was inaugurated, California’s daily updated map of ICU capacity showed that the state’s stay-at-home order wouldn’t be lifted any time soon, yet just a day later, the AP reported, suddenly the order was lifted for the Greater Sacramento area.”
In November of last year, Gavin Newsom was severely criticized after reports and photos indicated he attended a multi-family birthday party for a political adviser at The French Laundry in Napa, California. Initially, a spokesperson defended Newsom’s decision to participate in the event, arguing that it took place outdoors. Days later, however, that excuse fell to the wayside when photos revealed the party took place indoors with almost no social distancing and no mask-wearing. Newsom eventually apologized, writing it off as a mistake.
“I want to apologize to you because I need to preach and practice, not just preach and not practice, and I’ve done my best to do that,” Newsom said. “We’re all human. We all fall short sometimes.”
Related: California Hiding COVID Data From Public, Says Releasing Information Would Confuse Residents