LOS ANGELES: Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said on Thursday that he turned down an offer to work in the administration of President-elect Joe Biden, so he can focus on the city as it grapples with record-breaking coronavirus infections.
Garcetti, a Democrat who had been mentioned as a possible candidate for Secretary of Transportation in a Biden administration, said that with coronavirus cases, hospitalisations, and deaths spiralling in America’s second-largest city he felt he needed to stay on as mayor.
“There were things on the table for me, but I said to (the Biden administration) very clearly … I need to be here now,” Garcetti told reporters during a live-streamed news conference from his home.
“I want to be here, and I need to be here.”
He declined to say if Biden had offered him a specific position in the Cabinet.
The mayor, who is quarantining at home after his daughter tested positive, said that Wednesday saw the highest number of cases and deaths yet in Los Angeles.
“We expect to have more dead bodies than we have spaces for them,” the mayor said. “That frightens me, and it should frighten you.”
Garcetti has imposed on Los Angeles some of the strictest clampdowns in the US and has drawn criticism from business owners who said his ban on even outdoor dining threatened to put them out of business.
The mayor said that despite those tough restrictions Los Angeles County had more than 5,000 people hospitalised and was seeing one Covid-related death every 15 minutes.
He criticised members of the US Congress for failing to reach a deal on a stimulus package that would provide relief to Americans who had been thrown out of work or lost their businesses during the pandemic.
“The leaders in Washington are abandoning the firefighters protecting us, the police officers,” he said.