Las Vegas mayor slams coronavirus shutdowns of nonessential businesses as 'total insanity'

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Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman called the closing of nonessential businesses in Nevada "total insanity" during a city council meeting on Wednesday, and pushed for state officials to speed up the recovery process before it's too late.

"This shutdown has become one of total insanity in my opinion," she said. "For there is no backup of data as to why we are shut down from the start. No plan in place, how to move through the shutdown or how even to come out of it."

Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolack, a Democrat, originally ordered all casinos, movie theaters, bars, restaurants and gyms to close on March 17. He later issued an official stay-at-home order on April 1.

Goodman, who was formerly a Democrat and is now an independent, called for the entire state to be reopened as soon as possible, to avoid further economic fallout.

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"Our entire tourism and convention industry business has been shut down. It makes no sense. It makes no sense," she continued. "From my perspective, we must open our city. We must open Southern Nevada, and we must open the state of Nevada."

Goodman claimed people are capable of abiding by strict sanitary standards and should be allowed to return to work so they can begin rebuilding their lives.

"We cannot keep our heads in the sand, and think it's going to go away. We're adults with brains who can know what to do, to wash our hands, to take all precautions not to spread this disease," she explained.

"The longer we wait to do this, the more impossible it will become to recover and return to the home we all know and love," she added.

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As of Thursday, there were more than 648,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus in the U.S. and over 31,500 fatalities. In Nevada, there have been more than 3,300 confirmed cases of the disease and 137 deaths.