Owner Of IL Resort Forced Into Bankruptcy Over COVID19 Shutdown Says Tearful Goodbye To Customers: “I’m gonna be one of those statistics that don’t make it” [VIDEO]

Beth George, owner of the White Pines Resort in northwest Illinois, like so many other business owners across America, has come to the realization that she can no longer hold on to her business, and has filed for bankruptcy.

On Wednesday afternoon, George published a tearful message to her customers on Facebook.

“For those who don’t know me, my name is Beth George, and I own and operate White Pines Resort—which is a beautiful historic log lodge with a restaurant, and a dinner theater and cabins in the middle of White Pines State Park, about 100 miles west of Chicago,” George told her customers.

Choking back tears, she explained, “I wanna just tell you—that I never thought I’d be saying these words. For 31 years, I ran that resort and put my heart and soul into it. And, I’m putting this out on social media to let everyone know that I’m gonna be one of the statistics that don’t make it. I’m filing for bankruptcy and having to close down. I’m smart enough to know that this—-the numbers just won’t work for being able to reopen.”

“I followed the rules. I believed in doing flatten the curve, and closing down to have enough hospital beds and ventilators, and then, everything started to change, and I started hearing the rules about what will happen if and when we can ever reopen and the numbers just won’t work for my business. My business is based on numbers.” She explained that all of the types of business she does is based on numbers of 50 people or more. 

“When Governor Pritzker announced the phases for opening—there won’t people able to gather in 50 or more until there’s a vaccine.  Trump, who is the eternal optimist, is saying the soonest will be until December—and that probably won’t happen,” George said.

George asks, “What business could possibly go 16 months without being able to be opened?”

“I’m going bankrupt now, so I can hopefully pay back the brides who I took money for to pay off their weddings,” she said, asking people to buy items from her gift shop to help pay off her debts.

Watch her tearful goodbye here.

George is not alone in her realization that her business cannot sustain an extended shutdown. Businesses in blue states across America that are being forced to keep their doors shut for 2,3,4, 5 or even 6 months, are not going to survive. Americans who live in these states need to defend the rights of business owners to open their doors and allow citizens the right to make their own decisions about whether or not they want to patronize their businesses.