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Top GOP Georgia lawmakers flex muscle in latest school voucher push • Georgia Recorder

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Top GOP Georgia lawmakers flex muscle in latest school voucher push • Georgia Recorder


An expansion to Georgia’s school voucher program is getting another shot this year after passing the House Education Committee on party lines Wednesday.

The latest form of the bill would allow parents to accept $6,500 to pull their children out of a public school with low performance metrics and enroll them in private school or teach them at home. Expanding vouchers has been a dream of conservatives in Georgia for a while now, who say a free market approach benefits students who are not well served by their local public school district.

That conservative priority came close to becoming reality last year when a voucher plan passed the state Senate, but it failed when a handful of House Republicans joined nearly all Democrats in voting against it. Opponents say vouchers transfer money from school districts in need of more funding and send it to private enterprises that are not accountable to public scrutiny, and that $6,500 does not cover tuition at reputable private schools, so the vouchers will only act as a discount to families that can already afford it.

“This does not empower parents at all to choose where their children go to school,” said Lisa Morgan, president of the Georgia Association of Educators. “It empowers private schools to make those choices. Private schools are not required in any sense to accept a student who has one of these vouchers. The private school still can discriminate on the basis of disability. The private school can still discriminate on any number of characteristics of the student. The parents are not empowered here. The private schools have a choice, and that’s what we need everyone to understand.”

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The bill’s chances of becoming law appear higher this year with the support of the House’s highest-ranked member, Speaker Jon Burns, who made an appearance at Wednesday’s committee meeting to boost the bill.

Burns said Wednesday’s meeting was his first time at an Education Committee, and he made it clear he wants the bill to move forward.

“I would like for our House to send a clear signal that we will not let our children continue to be trapped in a failing school, that we’re taking a stand, give the parents of Georgia better options, and we are unlocking doors to the future for the children across this state,” he said.

“I hope when y ‘all’s discussion finishes, this committee will make a decision to move this bill forward,” he added.

Gov. Brian Kemp has also shown strong support for vouchers. Kemp told reporters Tuesday that he has been “patiently awaiting the House’s work” on the bill. The governor pressed lawmakers to pass a school voucher bill earlier this session in his State of the State address, saying then that “I believe we have run out of ‘next years’” to get it done.

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“It’s my hope that we’ll get that done this year, and yes, we will be aggressively pushing for that once we know what the House’s posture’s going to be,” Kemp said Tuesday.

Another top Republican, Speaker Pro Tem Jan Jones, presented the bill to the committee with many changes over last year’s.

The bill would make teacher pay raises approved over the past few years permanent.  It would allow public schools to use state capital construction dollars to build or renovate Pre-K facilities.

It creates a new body called the Georgia Education Savings Authority to administer school voucher programs, and, similar to a bill that passed the Senate last month, it creates rules for students to transfer between public school districts.

It still applies to students zoned into the lowest-performing 25% of schools, but Jones said she added a provision giving priority to students whose parents earn less than 400% of the federal poverty line, or $120,000 a year for a family of four in 2024.

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Jones also added a cap to the program of 1% of the cost of the Quality Basic Education formula used to determine the state’s school funding share, equaling more than $100 million. Education accounts for about a third of the state’s $30 billion-plus

Speaker Pro Tem Jan Jones. Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder

annual budget.

Speaking to the Recorder after the vote, Jones said she’s quite confident the House will pass the bill.

Why?

“20 years of vote counting,” she said with a laugh.

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Republicans on the committee were effusive in their praise of the bill, including Atlanta Rep. Mesha Mainor, who switched parties last year after she faced heavy criticism for backing vouchers.

“I loved the bill last year, I love it now,” she said. “It meets the needs of so many different families.”

Democrats were more circumspect. Powder Springs Rep. David Wilkerson said they had little time to review the 39-page document.

“While the majority party, as the speaker alluded to, may have had 350 days actually to review this bill, we’ve had probably 35 minutes,” he said.

Democrats proposed two amendments, one to require private schools that receive state money to accept all candidates and one to require that all teachers in participating schools be professionally certified. The committee voted against the amendments on a party line basis.

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Voucher supporters say the plan would not harm public school budgets. That’s because schools get money both from the state and local taxes. Supporters say the $6,500 would cancel out the state share of funds, but schools would still collect local taxes for students who take advantage of the program.

Opponents say that doesn’t add up because schools would be out $6,500 for each student, but they can’t lower the salary of a teacher whose class size decreases, and fewer students doesn’t translate to less cost to heat or cool a building or transport children to and from the school.

A poll commissioned by the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute and University of Georgia School of Public and International Affairs Survey Research Center suggests Georgia voters and parents aren’t wild about vouchers.

Pollsters asked registered Georgia voters how the state should support students in underperforming schools, giving them the options to give parents $6,500 to pay for private school tuition, provide schools with more state support or increase choice options like dual enrollment or charter schools.

A plurality of voters, 43.7% said schools should get more state support, 29.4% said more school choice options and 14.8% preferred the $6,500 vouchers.

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Voucher support increased somewhat when pollsters asked respondents with school-aged children which policy would be best for their family. Among parents, 22.6% said $6,500 vouchers would be best for them, 39.8% said they want more state support, and 31% favor increased choice options.

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Two freshman Georgia football players arrested on shoplifting charges

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Two freshman Georgia football players arrested on shoplifting charges


Georgia offensive lineman Dontrell Glover and running back Bo Walker were arrested for shoplifting at a Walmart on Friday, less than a week after the Bulldogs won the SEC Championship.

According to the Athens Banner-Herald, the freshmen were booked into Clarke County jail in Athens on two counts of misdemeanor shoplifting. Glover and Walker were arrested Friday evening and released on $1,526 bond before 8 p.m.

“We were informed of the charges and are currently in the process of gathering additional information,” Georgia spokesman Steve Drummond said in a statement. “This is a pending legal matter and we will not have further comment at this time.”

Walker played six games this season and rushed for 100 yards and three touchdowns. Glover started 11 games in 2025 and was named to the All-SEC freshman team.

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Last month, offensive lineman Nyier Daniels was dismissed from the team by head coach Kirby Smart after he was arrested on more than a dozen criminal charges after he allegedly tried to flee from police north of Athens.

The Bulldogs beat Alabama last Saturday in the SEC title game and earned a place in the College Football Playoff. They will play again on Jan. 1 against the winner of Ole Miss-Tulane in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals.



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DOJ files suit to obtain 2020 election records in Fulton County, Georgia

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DOJ files suit to obtain 2020 election records in Fulton County, Georgia


The Justice Department sued Fulton County, Georgia, this week in an effort to obtain more than five-year-old ballots tied to the 2020 presidential election which President Donald Trump lost.

The eight-page complaint filed in federal court in Atlanta on Thursday, names Fulton County Clerk of Courts Che Alexander as a defendant, alleging that the clerk violated the Civil Rights Act by failing to produce records tied to the 2020 presidential election as requested by state and federal officials.

The lawsuit asks that the court demand that the records be produced within five days of a court order.

According to the lawsuit, the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections last month refused to comply with an Oct. 6 subpoena, from the state’s election board, for election records, including used and void ballots, stubs, and signature envelopes from the 2020 presidential election, saying in a Nov. 14 letter that the records were “under seal” in accord with state law.

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The lawsuit states that the board later failed to respond to a letter from Attorney General Pam Bondi on Oct. 30, demanding the records which she said were needed to review the state’s compliance with federal election laws and meet state transparency efforts.

Alexander and the Fulton County Board of Registration and Elections did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Friday night.

Alexander had previously said in an Oct. 21 letter to the state election board that “the records sought are under seal and may not be produced absent a Court Order,” according to the lawsuit.

Trump was indicted on felony charges in Fulton County in August 2023 along with 18 other co-defendants in connection with efforts to overturn his election loss.

Trump pleaded not guilty to charges that were dropped last month by a prosecutor who took the reins of the case following Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ disqualification from prosecuting Trump in the matter.

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Georgia has long been a sore spot for Trump after a narrow loss in 2020 that he has spent years disputing.

After a manual recount of election results in Georgia that reaffirmed President Joe Biden’s narrow win in the state in 2020, Trump, who was then seeking a second term, had also called then-Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and implored him to “find” the votes needed to defeat Biden in the 2020 election. Since then he has continued to falsely claim he won the state.

The Fulton County lawsuit from the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division comes as it announced on Friday that it had filed federal lawsuits against four states — Colorado, Hawaii, Massachusetts and Nevada — alleging that the states had violated the Constitution by failing to produce statewide voter registration lists upon request.

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement Friday that states “have the statutory duty to preserve and protect their constituents from vote dilution.”

“At this Department of Justice, we will not permit states to jeopardize the integrity and effectiveness of elections by refusing to abide by our federal elections laws. If states will not fulfill their duty to protect the integrity of the ballot, we will,” Dhillon said.

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Georgia’s Utility Regulator Rushes Deal for Georgia Power Before Public Hearing – CleanTechnica

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Georgia’s Utility Regulator Rushes Deal for Georgia Power Before Public Hearing – CleanTechnica



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ATLANTA, Georgia — An hour before hearing testimony from the public and advocacy groups, the Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) posted a settlement agreement approving Georgia Power’s plan to build the most expensive gas plants in the country, leaving Georgians to foot the bill.

The settlement, which the PSC is expected to vote on during its Dec. 19 meeting, approves Georgia Power’s “Requests for Proposals,” or RFP, despite clear warnings from the Sierra Club, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, and PSC’s own staff that Georgia Power’s plan hinges on a data center bubble. The utility’s proposal is expected to cost at least $15 billion in capital costs, though the total costs have yet to be publicly disclosed. The proposed settlement would dramatically increase Georgian’s energy bills for years to come for data centers that might not even be built. Several counties in Georgia have already passed moratoriums on data centers, awaiting more insight into their potential impact on local communities.

“This proposed settlement is the largest single investment in electric infrastructure in the state’s history. It calls for building the most expensive gas plants in the country and will result in higher prices for consumers and more pollution in our communities. It will cause temperatures to go up, more frequent and more powerful storms, and deadlier floods and heatwaves,” said Dekalb County resident Lisa Coronado during the Dec. 10 hearing. “But Georgia Power doesn’t care about any of that. When the temperatures go up, Georgia Power makes more money because Georgians run their air conditioning more often. When climate-change fueled storms wreck our infrastructure, Georgia Power passes repair costs onto us.”

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The settlement includes promises of “downward pressure” for ratepayers’ bills, but Georgia Power’s claim that typical ratepayers will eventually see a reduction of $8.50 per month is short-sighted. First, Georgia Power has made similar promises in the past and continued to raise rates. Second, the proposed rate decrease would only cover three years, whereas ratepayers will have to pay for gas plants for 45 years.

In response, the Sierra Club released the following statement:

“The PSC’s own expert staff said Georgia building gas plants was not in the best interest of ratepayers,” said Adrien Webber, Sierra Club Georgia Chapter Director. “At a time when the PSC should be fighting for affordability for Georgians, they instead push through a plan that will continue to squeeze Georgia families already struggling to make ends meet. As we consider our next steps, it’s clear that the people of Georgia demand change from our PSC and the Sierra Club will continue to fight to make that change happen.

“‘Georgia Power’s agreement is still based on the idea that data center projects are coming, which is not guaranteed,” Webber continued. “The PSC’s own staff saw Georgia Power’s plan as overbuilding for projects that may or may not appear, threatening to leave the cost for ratepayers to pick up. It’s infuriating that Georgia Power and the PSC refuse to even take public comment or insight from advocates into consideration before coming to this agreement. Filing this agreement just an hour before the second round of hearings shows that the PSC refuses to be held accountable to the people of Georgia.”

About the Sierra Club: The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with millions of members and supporters. In addition to protecting every person’s right to get outdoors and access the healing power of nature, the Sierra Club works to promote clean energy, safeguard the health of our communities, protect wildlife, and preserve our remaining wild places through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. For more information, visit www.sierraclub.org.

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