A leader from a group demanding that North Carolina eliminate preventative measures and allow businesses to reopen amid the COVID-19 pandemic has been arrested after refusing police orders on Tuesday, Newsweek reported.
Ashley Smith is one of the administrators of the Facebook group ReOpen NC. A different leader of the group recently made headlines after it was revealed that she had tested positive for the virus.
Smith and others from the group were arrested and charged with resisting arrest and violating Governor Roy Cooper’s stay-at-home order banning large gatherings, according to local news outlet WNCN. They were arrested after being told to not conduct their protest on the governor’s mansion property and allegedly refusing to oblige.
“We’ll all go to church, we’ll open our businesses and we’ll buy what we want,” Smith told the crowd before she was arrested, according to The News & Observer. “We will not go down gently. … If you feel the need to stay home, it is your God-given right to do so. But we want to live!”
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