Correction on Medicaid ACTION! (Wrong Link Last Week)

Thanks to all of you who pointed out that the link to the Medicaid Waiver Public Comment was wrong in last week’s Snapshot!

Review of the Issue: — the Georgia Pathways program (low income Medicaid) requires 20 hours of work or school to be eligible. In Governor Kemp’s original proposal, he did not allow for any type of caretaking to count as work. Now he’d like to get permission from the Feds to include taking care of children 6 and under as work. But that still leaves out taking care of an elderly parent, a disabled family member, or an older child.

Use this link (https://secure.everyaction.com/ldYGqMj-EUKD2YNZ2EB0JQ2) and follow the instructions provided by Georgians for a Healthy Future to make a public comment. The deadline is February 20th. The more comments the better — these comments really do make a difference!

Temperatures Are Rising at the Georgia Capitol

Lobbyists typically hover near the doors to the Senate in the morning around 10am, when Senators make their way to the chamber for roll call. A typical exchange goes like this:

“Morning, Senator. How’s your session going so far?”

“Pretty good.”

“Everyone’s still getting along?’

“Yep. Things are still good.”

But this week the sweat really started breaking out.

Democrats Turn Up the Heat

The chaos of the second Trump era is unfolding in ways no one predicted. While we knew about Project 2025, Elon Musk’s control over sensitive government systems came out of left field. As state legislators, we must use our megaphones to stop the Trump/Musk agenda from spreading to the state level.

Open Mic: Senators get five minutes each day for a “point of personal privilege.” Senator Josh McLaurin from north Fulton uses his time for “Trump Morning News”—a satirical take on the latest developments in D.C., delivered like a morning podcast. Check out his video, which went viral this week. By midweek, Republicans were feeling a little hot under the collar. One senator rushed to defend Trump, insisting he’s only been in office for a few weeks. Another tried to dodge Trump’s January 6th pardons by deflecting to Joe Biden’s. They were clearly on the defense.

Other Democrats are making their voices heard too. Senator Derek Mallow from Savannah called out how Chinese tariffs are already hurting Georgia businesses, sharing how a wedding dress shop in his district had to cancel customer orders after USPS stopped shipping fabric from China. Senator Nabilah Islam of Gwinnett, the daughter of immigrants, slammed Trump’s unconstitutional attack on birthright citizenship and his plan to seize and redevelop Gaza into a riviera.

Keeping the Abortion Debate on Fire

Team Work: You can see that the Senate Democratic Caucus is really energized this year. That’s in part due to a new Executive Director, a new communications team, and a team of legal externs keeping members informed about all of the bills moving through the Senate. They’re bringing fresh ideas, like “walk and talk” videos where senators break down policy while walking the halls of the Capitol.

Abortion on the Ballot: I filmed my first walk and talk video this week on SR 84, my bill that proposes to enshrine abortion rights in Georgia’s Constitution. One of the most common questions I get is: Why can’t we vote on abortion like other states? The answer: Georgia doesn’t allow direct ballot measures. A constitutional amendment is the only way to let voters decide. For decades, Republicans argued that “the people” should decide this issue—SR 84 gives them that chance.

Minority Leader Harold Jones and I held a press conference to formally announce the resolution, and that night I debated Senator Ed Setzler, author of Georgia’s abortion ban, on GPB’s Lawmakers (see linked video starting at minute 17).

ACTION!: A constitutional amendment requires a ⅔ vote in both chambers—a steep climb. If you want the right to vote on abortion access, make some noise. Call or write your state legislators and demand they support SR 84 — including legislators you know already support it. They need to hear from you too.

Striking While the Iron Is Hot

Transforming the Narrative of Equity in Girls Sports: On Tuesday, I joined fellow female legislators to support SB 41, introduced by Senator Kim Jackson of DeKalb. Republicans claim their SB 1—a bill banning transgender girls from school sports—is about fairness. Jackson countered with a bill that addresses the real inequities in girls’ sports.

“If we want to have a real conversation about true “fairness” and “safety” in girls’ sports …. then let’s talk,” said Senator Jackson in her press conference speech, “Let’s talk about how girls’ teams are made to practice late at night or early in the morning when it’s still dark outside. Let’s talk about how girls’ soccer coaches . . .make one-third the pay of the football coaches. Or how some girls’ sports teams are assigned teacher supervisors who have no coaching experience… because the pay inequity is so steep that the qualified coaches won’t take the job.”

Later in the week, she held Republicans’ feet to the fire, introducing her bill as an amendment to SB 1, arguing that it would help more girls in Georgia than their transgender ban. Republicans voted it down.

The Resistance Heats Up

Focus on What you CAN Control: I’ve been reminding myself—and others—that we all have a role to play. No one can do it all, but if we focus on what we CAN do, others will step up to fill the gaps. We’re already seeing it—on Thursday, a group of activists showed up at the Capitol to protest the Trump administration.

Heather Cox Richardson, in her daily email Saturday stated, “Maya Miller of the New York Times reported today that the congressional phone system has been jammed with tens of millions of calls from outraged constituents . . . The Senate phone system usually gets about 40 calls a minute; now it is up to 1,600.” That’s an increase of 4000 percent! If you haven’t made phone calls yet, do it this week. Let’s double that number! (Subscribe to Heather Cox Richardson here).

These calls work. I got one call this week from a constituent who asked me why I was being so quiet about what Elon Musk is doing. Recognizing that I serve at the state level rather than federal, she begged me to at least post something on social media. This motivated me to write a video script about the situation for my “What’s It Matter to You?” series. I’m recording that video on Monday.

If you haven’t already, subscribe to my YouTube channel. And share my Senate Snapshot newsletter with others so they can subscribe. I’ll be sure to include weekly actions people can take. This helps me turn up the volume of my megaphone.

Stay loud, stay engaged. The fight isn’t cooling off anytime soon.

A Polar Vortex Shuts Down the Georgia State Capitol

This week at the Capitol, almost nothing happened. Public budget hearings were cancelled due to snow, and rather than being rescheduled they were replaced with private meetings with Republican leadership. In the era of virtual technology, this seems unconscionable. The elimination of state public budget hearings is yet another chunk axed from the heart of our democracy.

For much longer than I can remember, the second week of Georgia’s legislative session has been dedicated solely to the budget, when state agency heads come to the Capitol to present their budget priorities and legislators ask them questions. It’s also where the Governor speaks to his vision for the coming fiscal year, and the State Economist gives his prediction for the economy. It’s all taken very seriously. I learned almost everything I know about the inner workings of state government by listening to these hearings.

During the last several years, I have heard government leaders plead for funding because they don’t have enough staff to do what their agencies were created to do. Sometimes their pleas were so fierce I thought they’d be fired by the Governor the next day.

Since early in his first term, Governor Kemp has systematically dismantled state government through a dual strategy of cutting budgets and drastically underestimating the revenue. Instead of investing in Georgia and its people, the Governor has hoarded billions of dollars into rainy day accounts. He has even regularly cut the gas tax so that the Georgia Department of Transportation gets its funding through the general funds — money intended for schools and healthcare — instead of motor fuel taxes, as our constitution prescribes.

Georgia’s income tax rate had been set at 6% since the 1930s and stayed that way until recently. Governor Kemp has proposed to reduce it again to 5.19 percent for FY 2026. There is no way to implement these cuts without taking it from education and healthcare.

And now these agency heads, who understand the importance of governing, have been silenced — not by a polar vortex but by a political vortex. In the halls of Democracy, silence gives authoritarianism the opportunity to thrive.

Jimmy Carter and the Budget

During Jimmy Carter’s governorship (1971-1975), he completely reformed the structure of Georgia’s government, reducing it from almost 300 agencies, board and commissions to 20 departments, eliminating duplication and streamlining services. His goal was to create a government more responsive to the people.

This basic government structure, as well as the zero-based budgeting process he implemented, still exists today — at least for now. But it’s in jeopardy.

Action Needed

The Appropriations Chairs in both the House & the Senate need to hear from you that the Budget Hearings should be rescheduled instead of cancelled. Legislators are the voice of the people, and they deserve to hear from agency heads before deciding what gets funded and what doesn’t. The legislative branch should not just rubberstamp the Governor’s budget.

House Appropriations Chair
Rep.Matt Hatchett
404-463-2247
matt.hatchett@house.ga.gov

The full House Appropriations Committee (Click here to see if your Representative is a member, and if so, contact them as well).

Senate Appropriations Chair
Sen. Blake Tillery
404-656-5038
blake.tillery@senate.ga.gov

The full Senate Appropriations Committee (Click here to see if your Senator is a member, and if so, contact them as well).

Breaking the Silence

Now is the time to speak out. Last week I asked for your thoughts about the redirection of general funds away from public education through tax credits for private schools. Thank you to all who responded with deeply personal stories about the unacceptable conditions of many of our public schools. These stories strengthen my resolve and arm me with the tools I need to push back on the narratives that misrepresent reality in order to bolster the elite.

I will always speak the truth, so please share this Snapshot with others. Stay involved, and get others involved. Focus on what you can control instead of what you can’t. Pay attention to local government, where you can feel the difference you make. Support your elected officials whose values align with yours. We need each other as we navigate through these scary times.

The Sausage Factory – Sine Die Style

Laws and sausages, you should never watch either one being made.
— Otto von Bismarck

The Republican Sausage Factory Kicks Into Overdrive

Driving to the Capitol this week, I felt like I was headed to a Republican bill-making factory. Fortunately most of the bills were harmless, but occasionally the Senate Democratic Caucus had to put up a good fight to send some rancid bills to the garbage.

On Thursday we blew through the midnight deadline and worked until almost 1 am when the Majority Leader finally moved to adjourn Sine Die. It was a very, very long day.

A Crazy Way to Make Dinner

You THOUGHT you knew how a bill becomes a law? I bet you never learned in school about “Frankenstein” bills (several bills stuffed into one) or “Christmas Tree” bills (parts of bills amended on to another).

We often see these at the end of session, but this year Republicans took bill slicing and dicing to a whole new level. Senators offered amendments left and right from the floor on bills that were already patched together. It was hard keeping up with what we were voting on. Bill numbers and captions stayed the same even when the content changed.

Sausages That Made it Through the Factory

The State Budget: Passing a balanced budget is the only Constitutionally-mandated requirement of the General Assembly. This year, we fulfilled that duty at 10:45pm on the last day of the session when we agreed to the Conference Committee report for HB 916, reconciling the House and Senate versions of the FY 24/25 budget.

The $36.1 billion budget, down slightly from this year’s spending, includes raises for state employees, teachers, university employees, and law enforcement. It also includes measures championed by Democrats including money for childcare, domestic violence and sexual assault response, and school lunches.

My budget success this year includes $79 million for caretaker raises, a direct result of passing my rate study bill (SB 610, 2022). I also obtained $250,000 for Clubhouse Atlanta, a non-profit in Dunwoody that provides space, support and structure for people in recovery or who have chronic mental health challenges.

What’s not in the budget? Money to arm teachers in schools. Credit goes to those of you who sprang into action over the weekend with phone calls and emails after reading a note in the AJC about an increase in school safety funds to cover Lt. Governor Burt Jones’ plan to arm and train teachers. Both the House and Senate Appropriations Chairs confirmed that school safety money was NOT for arming teachers, and the Budget Conference Committee removed the extra money. You were LOUD and you were heard!

Election Frankenbill: Just after midnight on Sine Die, Republicans pushed through a Frankenstein bill that cobbled together several bad election bills. Here’s some of what SB 189 does:

1. Allows third-party candidates on the statewide ballot if at least 20 other states do the same. This opens the door for independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to challenge President Biden here.
2. Places additional undue administrative burdens on county elections offices by requiring them to report absentee ballot counts within one hour of polls closing,
3. Defines “probable cause” for mass voter challenges. Republicans claim this will help clarify these challenges, but Democrats want to do away with them altogether because they perpetuate the myth of widespread voter fraud and overwhelm our local elections staff, and
4. Eliminates QR codes on election ballots after July 2026. (If only they had listened to me in 2019 when I warned them that voters would be suspicious of codes they can’t read.)

Property Tax Cap: Recognizing that rising property taxes are a pain point for many Georgians, we passed a Constitutional amendment to limit property value assessments to the current rate of inflation. A Constitutional amendment requires a two-thirds vote in both chambers, and this one passed easily with bipartisan support. You’ll have a chance to vote on this measure in November.

The Official State Crustacean: When I asked you in my last Snapshot to guess the Official State Crustacean, one of you got it right! The White Shrimp got the honor with the passage of HB 1341.

A Pause to Celebrate Colleagues

The final days of the biennium are often bittersweet, especially when we have to say goodbye to long- time colleagues who won’t be returning to the Gold Dome. We celebrated the retirement of three long-serving trailblazing Senators — Sen. Valencia Seay, Sen. Horencia Tate, and Minority Leader Gloria Butler.

David Cook, our longtime Secretary of the Senate, also announced his retirement. We all count on David and his team to make sure everything in the Senate runs smoothly from orchestrating our floor sessions to taking care of all of our administrative needs. It’s hard to imagine the Senate without his steady hand.

Making My Own Sausage

When my bill for an Innovation Commission for Adults with Developmental Disabilities, SB 198, was hijacked and completely stripped in the House Public Health Committee I hatched a plan to attach the original bill language to the new SB 198 when it came back to the Senate. I enlisted the support of the Lt. Governor’s office and one of my Republican colleagues, I worked with Legislative Counsel to prepare a floor amendment, and I kept a close eye on SB 198 all week.

Late afternoon on Thursday, I was informed by the Lt. Governor’s office that the new language was a priority for House Speaker Burns and our plan was no longer viable. We tried to come up with another plan, but time ran out. With my bill being left on the cutting room floor, the Commissioner of the Dept. of Behavioral Health & Developmental Disabilities has asked me to participate in a workgroup on this issue during the interim.

My Study Committee resolutions to review ways to protect kids from social media and expand higher education in prisons also never made it out of the Senate Rules Committee, but I have received commitments from the Lt. Governor and a couple of Committee Chairs to work on these efforts during the interim through regular Standing Committee meetings.

Sausages Left on the Factory Floor

Thankfully the House declined to take up several culture war bills sent over by Senate Republicans.

More Transgender Discrimination: HB 1104 was originally a great bill to help student athletes with mental health challenges. Then it was stuffed with a ban on transgender students in sports, a ban on transgender students using bathrooms of their gender identity, and another bill to prohibit sex education in schools before sixth grade. Meanwhile HB 1170 was hijacked to ban puberty blockers for transgender kids. The House adjourned Sine Die without passing either.

American Library Association Bill: SB 390 was a bill to cut ties with the American Library Association (ALA) after its President referred to herself as a “Marxist lesbian.” The ALA sets standards and provides training for librarians and provides grant funding for our libraries, so this bill would have been detrimental to our libraries.

Religious Liberty: SB 180 was another failed attempt at instituting “religious liberty” which is typically a thinly veiled license to discriminate against LGBTQ+ and non-Christians.

The Official Bread of Georgia: Cornbread lost its bid to become the Official Bread of Georgia when the Senate declined to take up HB 1048.

What’s Next: Help Me Make More Sausages

As the session comes to a close, it’s now time to gear up my re-election campaign. I’m facing primary and general election opponents, and I need your help. If you appreciate my work and enjoy these Snapshots, I hope you’ll support my campaign by donating, placing a yard sign in your yard, or volunteering your time. Look for another email very soon to find out how you can help.

It’s been an honor and pleasure representing you and I have so much unfinished business I still want to accomplish. I hope you’ll vote in both elections to send me back to the Senate.

“Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around every once in a while, you could miss it.” — Ferris Bueller

Follow the Leader

Medicaid Expansion and Hospital “CON” Reform

Instead of using hospital regulatory reform (Certificate of Need, aka CON) as a bargaining chip for Medicaid Expansion as North Carolina did, Georgia Republicans are following the lead of the Governor by refusing once again to expand Medicaid.

This week, the Senate passed HB 1339, the CON reform bill. Among other things, the Senate version exempts ambulatory surgery centers from CON regulations. These centers don’t have to accept Medicaid patients and cherry pick off the more profitable procedures, leaving local hospitals to fund the non-profitable procedures.

I knew there was some GOP support for Medicaid expansion in the House, but this week I overheard some Republican Senators saying we should have expanded Medicaid before reforming CON. They’re worried about hospitals in their districts. What a missed opportunity to help people and communities across Georgia with the resources needed to support life.

Follow the Votes: Transgender Medical Treatment

This week the Senate Health and Human Services Committee amended HB 1170, a good bill that makes opioid overdose antidotes readily available in public buildings, to include a ban on puberty blockers for transgender kids. Last year, when a slew of bills banning transgender care were introduced in state legislatures across the country, Georgia was one of the only states that kept puberty blockers available. What changed? Powerful Republican leaders are now facing far-right primary opponents and feeling the pressure. Look for SB 1170 to be on the Senate floor soon.

What won’t be on the Senate floor — SR 785, a resolution I filed on behalf of Community Estr(El/la), an immigrant transgender advocacy organization recognizing March 26th as Trans Liberation Day to honor the struggles and achievements of transgender people. Instead of being placed on a unanimous consent calendar for Privileged Resolutions, SR 785 was assigned to the very same Committee that banned puberty blockers. Think it’ll get a hearing? Probably not…

Follow the Middle Course: Suicide and Firearms

Democrats are constantly searching for ways to reduce gun violence that our Republican colleagues will support. This year, Senator Elena Parent and I may have found one in “Donna’s Law,” aka SB 522, a personal liberty bill that allows people with suicidal tendencies to put themselves on the “Do Not Sell” Firearms list to protect themselves from making a hasty, irreversible decision. Suicides, not homicides, account for the majority of gun deaths in Georgia.

It’s rare for a gun safety bill to get a hearing, but the Chair of the Senate Public Safety Committee allowed one for SB 522 this week. A variety of mental health experts and suicide prevention advocates testified in favor of the bill, including Donna’s daughter, Katrina Brees, who surprised us by flying in from Louisiana. Katrina believes that if “Donna’s Law” existed, her mother would still be alive today. We held a press conference later that afternoon. https://youtu.be/Zar0UlYDkNY?si=CVHyhGn6z0Wfjsor

Follow the Money: Data Centers and School Vouchers

Thursday, the Senate passed HB 1192, a bill that suspends a sales tax break for high-tech data centers for two years. Legislators have been scrutinizing the long list of tax incentives used to attract business to Georgia. It makes sense to study the cost benefit of these incentives, but a pause pulls the rug from under businesses that chose to locate here based on the tax incentive and causes uncertainty for projects in the pipeline. Environmental advocates informed us about the huge amount of natural resources data centers use, so I intend to watch the data storage industry for its impact on global warming.

Across the hall, the House passed SB 233, the school voucher bill that allows $6,500 per student to be used for private school or homeschooling, by just one vote. This year, to make it more palatable for Republicans who voted against it last year, House leadership loaded it with incentives like writing teacher pay raises into the school funding formula and allowing students to enroll in public schools outside of their districts. I’m sure primary pressure plays a role in the bill’s passage too. The amended bill will have to pass the Senate before it heads to the Governor’s desk.

Follow the Logic: Higher Ed in Prisons Study Committee

This week, I filed SR 770, a Study Committee Resolution to examine how we can offer higher education in Georgia prisons to reduce recidivism. Intern and constituent Lillian Hanson has been working on this issue all session, making connections with experts and advocates for our office so we can build on them in the years to come. When I asked the Chair of the Senate Higher Education Committee to sign the bill, his seatmate signed it too, saying, “It only makes sense!”

I also filed two other common sense bills this week — one that requires regular school building inspections like we do for restaurants, and a bill allowing colleges to opt out of Campus Carry and requiring gun storage and firearm safety training for those that allow guns on campus. While they won’t move this session, filing them now allows me to refile and move them more quickly next session.

Follow My Values

With only five legislative days remaining (expanded to two calendar weeks), now is the time when it’s easy to lose track of values. I campaigned hard on sticking to my values, and I believe they are why I have been re-elected three times.

In May, I am facing a primary election opponent due to my vote on HB30. While this bill was called the antisemitism bill, I think it will do little to reduce hateful acts toward Jewish people. However it will regulate how some of us speak about the Israeli government. America was founded on the courageous acts of standing against powerful government, and we may find ourselves in that position again, depending on the outcome of our 2024 election. My abstention on HB30 was a vote to protect the free speech of every American. While my opponent desires to make this race about war in the Middle East, I intend to stand for the justice and freedom that leads to peace.

Here’s my “inclusiveness” value that I followed: “We extend our world beyond our own family, community, and ethnic group to include a wide range of others — have-nots, minorities, the homeless, people with disabilities, people from other nations and even the earth itself.”

I still carry my “yellow value card” with me to the Capitol. It’s the card I made during the early 2000s when I served in the House and watched Republicans take over the legislature. I’ll keep it close at hand the next couple of weeks and follow it with every vote, even when it means someone might get mad at me.

We Need Your Urgent Follow Up!

SB 198, my bill to create an Innovation Commission for Adults with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (IDD), hit a major roadblock when the Chair of the House Public Health Committee declined to schedule a hearing for the bill. I spoke with the House Speaker’s office this week to ask for their help, and if you care about this issue, you should too. Call 404.656.5020 or email Jon.Burns@house.ga.gov to let him know that Georgia’s system to support adults with IDD is outdated and broken and that we need the Speaker’s help moving SB 198 forward to fix it.

I’ll be back at work at 9am Monday morning for the 36th legislative day.

Crossover Week

Georgia’s Crossover Hurricane Downgraded to a Tropical Depression

At the Georgia Capitol, there are two words that elicit both the excitement of parties and food alongside the dread of long working hours and mischief — Crossover and Sine Die.

Crossover Day: A “crossover” deadline is the last day for a bill to pass out of the chamber in which it was introduced and still move forward for consideration in the opposite chamber.

Sine Die: Latin, meaning to conclude without setting a date or time to reconvene.

Last Thursday, Legislative Day 28, was Crossover Day. From my experience, no matter how well you plan, you ultimately have no control over whether your legislation gets caught up in the Crossover storm.

Disabilities Commission Makes it in the Nick of Time

Case in Point, SB 198: I introduced SB 198 early in 2023 to create the “Families Living with Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities Innovation Commission.” It was assigned to the Senate Health & Human Services Committee, where I couldn’t get the Chairman to call it up for a vote. In early 2024 I had a chat with the Lt. Governor, and the logjam was removed. The bill passed out of Committee unanimously several weeks ago.

Next Step — the Rules Committee, which is like a giant sieve for bills. Some make it, but many don’t.

Despite my advocacy, and the advocacy of hundreds of volunteers, SB 198 didn’t make it out of Rules until the day before Crossover Day. But just being on the calendar for a floor vote on Crossover Day doesn’t mean it will actually get called up for a vote.

By dinner time on Crossover Day, we heard that the Lt. Governor would only be calling up a few more bills before adjourning. There were still more than 20 bills left on the Rules calendar, including SB 198.

When we returned from dinner, I was assured by the Lt. Governor’s right hand man that SB 198 would make the final list of bills. I can’t tell you how relieved I was when it was finally called up around 9 pm and passed 50-2.

Overall, about 15 bills, authored by both Republicans and Democrats, were left untouched before the Lt. Governor adjourned for the night well before midnight.

HBCU Bill Sparks Blustery Debate

One of the longest debates of the week was among Democrats over SB 235, a bill that creates an HBCU (Historically Black Colleges & Universities) Innovation and Economic Prosperity Planning Districts Commission. The Commission would design prosperity planning districts with local advisory committees around each of Georgia’s 10 HBCUs with the ultimate goal of raising funds to improve the schools and blighted areas around them.

While everyone agrees our HBCUs have been underfunded for decades, several legislators who were HBCU alumni strongly objected to the bill, arguing that it would create an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy with no accountability to the Board of Regents and the state. The bill ultimately passed.

Breezing Through Bills Before Crossover Day

After the HBCU debate, we got through the floor vote calendars pretty quickly in the days leading up to Crossover Day.

Here are just a few of the bills that blew through:

Sports Betting: Sports betting was back, this time with a Resolution for a Constitutional Amendment. The Senate passed a sports betting bill earlier this session, but it was a regular bill without a referendum. Senate Resolution 579 cleared the Senate with the required two-thirds majority. If it passes the House, Georgia voters will ultimately decide in November if we should amend our state Constitution to allow for sports betting.

Sheltering Kids from Social Media: The Senate passed the Lt. Governor’s bill, the “Protecting Georgia’s Children on Social Media Act” or SB 351. It directs the State Board of Education to develop programming on Internet safety, keeps kids from using social media in Georgia schools, and requires parents to give permission for certain social media accounts.

I’ve been very interested in this topic and doing lots of research. I’ve come across approaches that take some of the onus off of parents to constantly monitor their kids’ social media. I’m drafting a Study Committee resolution so we can dive more deeply into the possibilities.

Making College Transfers Easier: SB 399 requires the University System of Georgia and the Technical College System to work together to make credits more transferable between the two systems, making it less expensive for technical school students who choose to pursue four year degrees.

State Takeover of Local Boards of Health: SB 293 lessens the qualifications for local board of health directors from a medical degree to a masters degree and shifts the responsibility of appointing these directors from the local board to the state. I got some helpful advice from one of my local mayors on how to analyze this bill.

Youth Driving Dangers: SB 402 allows those with a Class D Drivers License held by 16 and 17 year olds to drive between the hours of midnight and 5:00 am. It also allows them to drive with an unrelated passenger, but limits that number to only one passenger under the age of 21. The timing of this bill seems horrible, given several catastrophic fatal teen driver accidents that occurred recently during early morning hours.

The Amended 24/25 Budget: The Senate approved the conference committee report from the House on this year’s amended budget. With the “little budget” done,” we’ll be working to pass the big budget for fiscal year 2025/26 in the coming weeks.

Crossover Day Gusts

With the torrent of bad bills that passed through Committees last week, we were expecting the worst, but were pleasantly surprised when many of them including the Chaplains in schools (SB 379), criminalizing school librarians (SB 154), and ending automatic voter registration (SB 221) bills did not make it to the Rules Calendar for Crossover Day.

The Democratic Caucus filed minority reports for the most controversial bills, which allows us to officially disagree with the Committee’s “do pass” recommendation and gives us more time on the floor to argue against the bill.

• The Religious Freedom Restoration Act (SB 180) provides a license to discriminate based on religious beliefs. The debate on this bill was cut short when a Democratic Senator moved to table the bill and the Majority Leader countered by calling the question which trumps a table motion. Because we filed the Minority Report, Senator Kim Jackson had the opportunity to give an impassioned personal speech about how this bill could hurt her and her family as a queer Episcopal priest married to a Muslim imam.
• The American Library Association (ALA) bill (SB 390) bans libraries from spending public and some private funds on ALA materials and eliminates the requirement for librarians to be ALA certified. In her Minority Report, the Senate Democratic Caucus Chair said that this bill “puts librarians on the front lines of culture wars” and questioned the wisdom of tying the hands of our libraries when Georgia has such dismal literacy rates.
• SB 517 immunizes law enforcement officers from criminal prosecution if the officer can prove that the use of force is lawful, justified, or falls within the department’s guidelines. Our police already enjoy strong criminal protections through qualified immunity. This bill will only make it more difficult for victims of unjustified or excessive use of force to seek justice.

Sadly, all of these bills passed and are now headed to the House. Also be on the lookout for all of those bad bills that didn’t make it to Crossover Day. They could easily come back to haunt us as bill amendments or hijacked bills.

Where Will the Winds Blow Next?

The Georgia General Assembly is currently the opposite of Congress. The Georgia Senate is controlled by the hard-liners while the House, under the leadership of Speaker Burns, has been more moderate. That means that the House now gets to deal with the culture war bills from the Senate while the Senate will take up the less controversial House bills.

We’ll still have plenty of substantive issues to dive into like HB 1180 that imposes limits on Georgia’s Film Tax Credit, HB 1105 that requires law enforcement to help immigration officials and imposes penalties on those that don’t, HB 1339 that makes changes to the state’s Hospital Certificate of Need regulations, and HB 1015 that accelerates an income tax reduction.

What to Watch:

WSB-TV reached out to talk about the need for more Medicaid Home & Community Based Support waivers for adults with developmental disabilities. You can watch the story here:

https://news.yahoo.com/does-state-budget-far-enough-233235543.html

For several years, Senate administrative assistants have designed a Senate “bingo” game for Sine Die. This tradition has grown, and now the press has extended the lore to Crossover Day. See AJC’s Maya Prahbu on “X,” formerly Twitter.

https://twitter.com/MayaTPrabhu/status/1763390246383673461

62% of Georgians disagree with our state’s strict abortion ban. When lawmakers make laws that go against what the people want, what can be done? Watch and share Sally’s Reels: sallyharrellga