At the White House, President Donald Trump reversed course Wednesday and criticized Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp — a major ally of the president — after Kemp promised to reopen nonessential businesses on Friday. 

President Donald Trump: “The spas and the beauty parlors and barber shops, tattoo parlors, I love ’em, but they can wait a little bit longer, just a little bit, not much, because safety has to predominate. We have to have that. So, I told the governor, very simply, that I disagree with his decision, but he has to do what he thinks is right.”

More than 700 people have died of the coronavirus in Georgia, which has one of the slowest testing rates in the U.S.

Governors in Tennessee, Florida and South Carolina are also reopening parks, beaches and nonessential businesses, over the strong objections of public health officials, who say reopening now will lead to a second wave of new infections and deaths.