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2016 Legislative Session

KKK defender gets to reshape Georgia’s civics education

State Rep. Tommy Benton, who made the news last year for defending the KKK and pushing for revisionist Confederate history, will now have a say in civics education in Georgia. Benton was just appointed by Speaker of the House David Ralston to the House Study Committee on Civics Education in Georgia. Benton, along with two of his colleagues in the House, will be responsible for assessing Georgia’s civics education and making recommendations to the state Board of Education.

2017 Legislative Session

Republicans championing transit?

Republicans down at the Capitol are angling to become champions of public transit. What’s going on? This doesn’t exactly strike me as a bread and butter Republican issue. While there are strong economic development arguments to be made for investing in public transit, Republicans tend to shy away from anything with the word “public” attached to it. David Ralston, the Speaker of the House, announced the Georgia Commission on Transit Governance and Funding, a new

2017 Legislative Session

The 2017 GOP legislative priorities (so far)

The legislative session has begun! For the next several months, our elected legislators will be drafting, vetting and voting on new laws. GOP leaders in both the House and the Senate have already begun talking up their legislative priorities. The first week is mostly ceremonial, but priorities are beginning to emerge. Expect that some leaders are also eyeing higher office for 2018. Republicans in the Senate have already announced their legislative priorities, which include transportation, education funding,

2017 Legislative Session

Gold dome ready for more fights over guns, campus carry

It looks like campus carry is going to get new life, at least according to Speaker David Ralston. Last legislative session, Gov. Nathan Deal vetoed just a few bills of the hundreds the legislature passed, the campus carry measure among them. This earned him quite a bit of ire from conservatives and gun advocates at the time, and now it’s being reported that Speaker David Ralston is looking to revive the measure. “Let’s put together

2016 Legislative Session

Unterman searching for right side of history on Medicaid

Have Georgia’s conservative lawmakers finally seen the light on Medicaid expansion? Maybe. Sen. Renee Unterman (R-Buford) (the lawmaker who made national headlines for blocking a bill to test rape kits) has been speaking publicly about moving in the direction of Medicaid expansion. This is an issue that we’ve already dissected in-depth on this blog in an excellent post by Crystal Muñoz and it’s an issue progressives and businesses have championed for years. But Sen. Unterman’s pivot

Education

Transphobia abounds in North Georgia

Students in North Georgia are the targets of the latest transphobic outcry. Parents in Fannin County, organized by school resource officer Anthony Walden, rallied last week against a policy supporting transgender students using bathrooms that align with their gender identity, instead of their sex assigned at birth. Parents packed the Thursday school board meeting to decry the policy, which stems from federal government guidance, with media reports of anywhere from one to three hundred people