181: Burgum walks back quarantine order

"I have to own the miscue," Governor Doug Burgum said on this episode of Plain Talk.

He was referring to a quarantine order issued by his administration earlier this week which carried with it a misdemeanor criminal charge for anyone who violated it.

The order applied to people who came into close contact with someone positive for COVID-19.

Burgum said interim State Health Officer Dr. Paul Mariani noticed, upon taking his new position, that in the area of quarantines North Dakota wasn't in compliance with CDC guidelines. "He wanted to align those two things," Burgum said.

The result was the now-rescinded order, which included the misdemeanor charge because state law requires that to be the penalty for disobeying orders from the SHO.

"We know the government telling people what to do in North Dakota doesn't work," Burgum said, adding that his administration's goal is "compliance" and not punishing people.

"It didn't flag for me personally...that we were going to have the storm of reaction we did," Burgum said.

He said he'd like to work with the Legislature in the next session to give the SHO position some flexibility to issue orders without a criminal consequence for violating them.

"There wasn't a way for us to say that's an infraction instead of a misdemeanor," Burgum said, adding that he'd like to "get people to stop focusing on the penalty."