Restaurants to Sell Groceries; Ricketts Reacts to Trump Claim of Authority

Nebraskans may soon be able to pick up everything from toilet paper to bread from their local restaurants. And Governor Pete Ricketts says social distancing rules will be relaxed gradually according to Nebraska’s needs, despite President Trump’s claim of “total” authority in such matters.

At his coronavirus response news conference Tuesday, Ricketts announced an executive order lifting the prohibition on restaurants selling products not labeled for retail sale. Officials say restaurants often buy products in bulk that don’t have nutritional information printed on the packaging.

Zoe Olson of the Nebraska Restaurant Association said the move will help restaurants as well as residents of small towns that may have a restaurant but no grocery store. Olson was asked what kind of products people will be able to get.

“They could buy cereal, they can buy eggs, they could buy butter because butter comes in sticks, milk, loaves of bread. Believe it or not, bread comes to restaurants in loaves individually wrapped. It just doesn't have a label on it. Paper towels, toilet paper, disinfectant. They have fresh produce, they have potatoes,” Olson said.

Olson said it will be up to individual restaurants to decide what they want to offer, and suggested checking by phone or social media to see what’s available. But she offered a scenario.

“You could certainly go through the drive thru and say, you know, ‘With my order I need two rolls of toilet paper,’ and that could be added to your order,” she said.

Olson said the Nebraska Grocery Industry Association supports the change.

Olson also cautioned against a scam going on, where callers suggest people buy Amazon gift cards, then give the caller the number so they can “donate” to restaurant workers. She said some of those calls are using her name or the name of other restaurant officials, and they’re not legitimate.

On another subject, Ricketts was asked about President Donald Trump’s comments Monday that when it comes to reopening the economy, he has ‘total’ authority. Trump was asked specifically about governors who have issued stay-at-home orders. Ricketts hasn’t done that, but Dr. Anthony Fauci of the White House coronavirus task force has praised him for doing the functional equivalent.

As reported by PBS, a reporter said “Just to clarify your understanding of your authority, vis-à-vis governors -- just to be very specific -- for instance, if a governor issued a stay at home order,”

Trump jumped in: “You say ‘my authority.,’ (It’s) the president's authority, not mine, because it's not me. This is, when somebody is the president of the United States, the authority is total. And that's the way it's gotta be,” he said.

“It’s total? Your authority’s total?” the reporter asked.

“It's total. It’s total. And the governors know that,” Trump replied.

Asked his view of the president’s statement, Ricketts began by saying the state is working well with federal authorities.

“We work collaboratively with our federal officials. You know, for example, going back to March when I think it was reported by the World-Herald, I was one of the first governors to put out a limit on how many people who gather -- that 250 person role that we put out on March 13. That was followed by the CDC reducing to 50. We followed that guideline. When the President went to 10 people, we followed that guideline. So we do work with our federal officials with regard to the steps we're taking to actually protect people here in the state of Nebraska,” Ricketts said.

And the governor downplayed any suggestion of conflict.

“There are people out there who are trying to drive a wedge between the president, governors, public health officials. Let's not get caught up in that Washington DC- type gotcha politics. Let's focus on the task at hand, which is managing the pandemic we have here in the state,” he said

However, when asked if the President changed the 10 person rule, whether he would consider that guidance or an order, Ricketts replied

“We’re going to do what is best for Nebraska. So we work collaboratively with federal officials and local officials. What we're going to do is make sure we continue to do what's right for Nebraska. So for example, I’d already said that as we look at …loosening these restrictions, it will just be that. We're not going to drop ‘em all at once. We're going to loosen them over time to make sure again, focusing on the big goal here of not overwhelming the healthcare system.”