Georgia
Bookman: Wealthy school voucher supporters send disapproving taxpayers the bill • Georgia Recorder
School vouchers are unpopular.
They are unpopular with liberal voters. They are unpopular with conservative voters.
In modern American politics, it is rare to find such agreement, with voters of all stripes recognizing that they pose an existential threat to public education.
Yet somehow, in Georgia and other states, voucher programs continue to be implemented against what appears to be strong bipartisan opposition.
How is that happening?
It’s happening because a relative handful of very wealthy people have made school vouchers their pet vanity project, using multi-million-dollar campaign chests to try to refashion state legislatures all across the country to do their will.
Jeffrey Yass of Pennsylvania, Betsy DeVos of Michigan, Richard Uihlein of Illinois, Charles Koch of Kansas and other billionaires are all funding crusades in states where they don’t live, threatening the health of public schools that their kids will never attend, because they believe they know better than residents of those states how their children should be educated.
In Texas, for example, Yass and others donated tens of millions of dollars to remove conservative legislators who had dared to vote against a universal voucher program. In legislative races, $10,000 can do a lot of damage, and in November they succeeded in removing 15 conservative anti-voucher legislators, replacing them with candidates willing to do their bidding.
In states such as Georgia, where public opposition has continued to frustrate straightforward attempts to implement universal vouchers, proponents have resorted to political intimidation, deception and bait-and-switch legislation to accomplish their goals.
Let’s start with the assertion that vouchers are highly unpopular.
In every single state, liberal or conservative, in which voters have had a chance to directly voice their opinion, pro-voucher referendums have been defeated, and usually by overwhelmingly margins.
It happened most recently last month in Nebraska, a conservative state that Donald Trump carried by 20 points. If vouchers are truly a grassroots conservative cause, with broad popular support, surely you would expect them to be popular in the Nebraska heartland.
Yet Nebraskans voted overwhelmingly, 57% to 43%, to repeal a voucher program that their state legislators had tried to impose on them. It was the third time that Nebraskans have directly voted against using taxpayer money to fund private schools.
In Kentucky, the story was much the same. State legislators, goaded by out-of-state donors, needed to change the state constitution to allow vouchers, but doing so required that they get voter approval. It didn’t happen. In a deep-red state that Trump carried by 30 points, the proposed voucher amendment was rejected by 30 points. It failed in every one of the state’s 120 counties, rural and urban.
It’s also important to note that the distorting effect of huge sums of campaign money from billionaire voucher proponents is not felt solely in legislative races. Republican megadonors have also made it clear to politicians with ambitions for higher office that if they want the type of large donations needed in national races, they better toe the line on vouchers.
So here in Georgia last year, Gov. Brian Kemp helped to strong-arm the state Legislature into narrowly passing what was sold to legislators and the public as a very limited voucher bill, estimated to provide $6,500 in taxpayer money to pay private-school tuition to students in the lowest-performing 25% of Georgia schools. As part of that bill, legislators authorized spending for vouchers for as many as 22,000 students who are supposedly “stuck” in those poor-performing schools.
Except ….
Suddenly, state education officials have reread that new law and now claim that it makes as many as 400,000 Georgia students eligible for vouchers, including hundreds of thousands who do not attend a low-performing school. That is a number that was never heard or seen during debate on the legislation.
State Rep. Chris Erwin, chair of the House Education Committee, told the Associated Press that wasn’t how the law was intended to work and he wants it rewritten.
House Speaker Pro Tem Jan Jones joined him, saying she also felt misled.
“That wasn’t my understanding,” she said of the expanded program.
This is hardly the first time that voucher proponents in Georgia have told the public one thing during debate on a bill, only to turn around and disavow those promises later. It’s the kind of bait-and-switch technique you turn to only when you know that your proposal is too unpopular to be adopted through honest means.
It’s also important to point out that the public’s distrust of vouchers is well-grounded in fact and reality. Study after study has found that vouchers do not improve education outcomes, and instead can cause significant harm. And just as opponents have warned for decades, most of the taxpayer money spent on vouchers is going to subsidize students in prosperous families who were already attending private school or being home-schooled. Relatively little is used to help public-school students “escape” into better schools, the supposed rationale for vouchers.
And because voucher advocates insist upon little or no regulation of such programs, abuses have become legendary.
In Florida, homeschooling parents are using tax money to fund family trips to Disney World. In Arizona, families are using vouchers to buy themselves big-screen TVs. In Arkansas, a state that ranks 45th in the country in teacher pay, a voucher program created in 2023 is paying for horseback riding lessons for home-schooled children.
Think about that. At a time when public schools often lack the funding for even basic supplies, voucher advocates are using taxpayer money for equestrian training.
You can cite any number of circumstances in which unregulated campaign money is distorting the political process in this country, but perhaps none is as egregious, blatant and potentially destructive as the debate over vouchers. Rural communities in particular are wary of proposals that would drain resources from their public schools, and if Democrats are looking for a way to restore common ground with those voters, the fight against vouchers offers a great opportunity to do so.
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CHARLOTTE, N.C. –Georgia Tech softball (30-27, 10-14 ACC) collected its second postseason conference honor as first baseman Addison Leschber was named to the 2026 ACC All-Tournament Team, as was announced by the conference following the 2026 ACC Softball Championship game on Saturday.
Leschber is Tech softball’s first All-Tournament honoree since Emma Kauf during the 2023 season. During the First Round of the ACC Championships, Leschber was nothing short of exceptional as she went 2-for-4 with one home run, one double, and five RBI. Leschber’s first-inning home run brought her to 13 home runs this season, the third most of any Yellow Jacket this season. In Tech’s fourth meeting of the season with Notre Dame, Leschber saw her 12th multi-RBI game and ninth multi-hit game of the season. The senior finished the season with 26 runs, 37 hits, seven doubles, 13 home runs, 42 RBI, and 83 total bases.
2026 ACC Softball Championship All-Tournament Team
Jessica Oakland, Duke
Addison Leschber, Georgia Tech
Bri Despines, Louisville
Madison Pickens, Louisville
Bree Carrico, Virginia Tech
Michelle Chatfield, Virginia Tech
Emma Mazzarone, Virginia Tech
Jasyoni Beachum, Florida State
Ashtyn Danley, Florida State
Jazzy Francik, Florida State (MVP)
Isa Torres, Florida State
UP NEXT
The Yellow Jackets will await their fate in the NCAA Tournament Selection show on Sunday, May 10, at 7 p.m. on ESPN2.
Full Steam Ahead
Full Steam Ahead is a $500 million fundraising initiative to achieve Georgia Tech athletics’ goal of competing for championships at the highest level in the next era of intercollegiate athletics. The initiative will fund transformative projects for Tech athletics, including renovations of Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field (the historic home of Georgia Tech football), the Zelnak Basketball Center (the practice and training facility for Tech basketball) and O’Keefe Gymnasium (the venerable home of Yellow Jackets volleyball), as well as additional projects and initiatives to further advance Georgia Tech athletics through program wide-operational support. All members of the Georgia Tech community are invited to visit atfund.org/FullSteamAhead for full details and renderings of the renovation projects, as well as to learn about opportunities to contribute online.
For the latest information on the Georgia Tech softball team, follow us on Twitter (@GaTechSoftball), Facebook, Instagram (@GaTechsoftball) or visit us at www.ramblinwreck.com.
Kirby Smart hasn’t hid from how Georgia goes about doling out dollars to its roster.
He wants veterans to make more than newcomers.
“I don’t want you to have to take a discount,” Smart recently told Josh Pate. “OK, a discount might be a little less than year one or two. We have we have traditionally paid our players junior and senior year as much as anybody at those positions. We don’t want to start [earlier] because I want you to earn it and work your way up.”
Smart acknowledges that route might hurt Georgia in recruiting. The 2026 recruiting cycle seems to reflect that. It was the first time Georgia signed a recruiting class that finished outside the top five of the 247Sports Composite rankings since Smart’s first class back in 2016. The Bulldogs had just two players finish in the top 50 of the player rankings, the fewest ever for a Smart signing haul.
Coming out of spring practice, it seems like the Bulldogs did a good job of identifying players who could fit and play immediately. Craig Dandridge, Tyriq Green, Khamari Brooks and Zykie Helton all had strong springs. None were viewed as top 50 overall prospects.
As for the top players on Georgia’s 2026 roster, most of them are in either their third or fourth seasons. KJ Bolden, Ellis Robinson, Nate Frazier and Chris Cole all signed as members of the 2024 recruiting class. Gunner Stockton is in his fifth year at Georgia and second as a starter.
Georgia’s 2026 team will be an older team compared to the one the Bulldogs had last season. Consider that Georgia started the year with only 10 members of the 2022 class on the roster and 13 players from the 2023 recruiting class.
This year, that number is up to 29 when you combine the number of players from the 2023 and 2024 recruiting classes on the Georgia roster. Georgia’s 2026 team will have 34 players with at least three years of experience in Athens. Last season, that number was just 25.
Part of the reason Georgia’s roster is a better reflection of its spending in 2026 is because it did a much better job of retaining talent with its 2024 class than it did with the 2023 group.
Going into last season, 13 of the 26 members of the 2023 recruiting class were no longer a part of the roster.
With the 2024 group, Georgia still has 23 of the 29 players it signed from the 2024 high school recruiting ranks. Georgia also has transfers London Humphreys and Xzavier McLeod entering their third seasons in Athens.
The gap between the two classes is particularly stark at the top. Georgia has not had just one of the 10 top 100 players it signed in the 2024 class depart the program before their third season in Athens. With the 2023 group, six of the 12 top-100 signees had already left Athens.
For as much fretting as there might about the state of Georgia’s current recruiting, the 2024 class was ranked first in the country. That collection of players, which Georgia has been able to keep together, is set to enter their season in Athens.
Georgia paid big to keep players like Bolden, Robinson and Frazier from entering the transfer portal. There was a kernel of truth when Smart ribbed Miami coach Mario Cristobal about sitting too close to Robinson at an award ceremony.
Robinson figures to be one of the best players in the country this coming season. We’ve often seen top recruits — CJ Allen and Monroe Freeling are examples from the 2023 class — have their best seasons in year three, before heading off to the NFL.
That is why it’s so important to keep recruiting classes together and retain talent on an annual basis. Georgia has done a better job with the 2024 class compared to the 2023 class to this point. That’s a big reason why there aren’t as many questions and concerns about Georgia this offseason compared to last offseason, even if it has made Georgia a bit boring to talk about from a national perspective.
Texas, Miami and LSU all spent big money to bring in new talent. With Georgia, it paid top dollar to keep its roster together. No SEC team had fewer players transfer out than Georgia’s 12. That offsets some concern about the Bulldogs also making the fewest additions in the transfer portal.
“We had some new guys on our roster,” Smart told Pate. “We had 26 new freshmen. We had eight new portals. So like with all that going on, we had new people. But at least we knew they were ours. And going through spring practice to me was much more enjoyable because you didn’t have this big dark cloud brewing of was he going to be here?”
Georgia still built a very successful team in 2025, as the Bulldogs won the SEC and made it back to the College Football Playoff. But Georgia has bigger goals and Smart knows it.
“Apparently, all we can do is win the SEC championship right now, so that’s not good enough,” Smart told Finebaum.
The Bulldogs are hoping that a more veteran team will set them up for even more success than they had a season ago. And that veteran element was acquired by keeping its one-time recruits in Athens for seasons three and four.
Georgia
A council meeting is called in a small Georgia town whose mayor fired the entire police department
COHUTTA, Ga. (AP) — The town council in a small north Georgia mountain community called a special meeting Friday evening to discuss reinstating the police department after the mayor fired the chief and all the officers.
The notice for the meeting, posted outside the Cohutta Town Hall, says the council will also consider a request for the mayor’s “immediate resignation.”
Another sign posted earlier this week in the town of about 930 people announced that the police department had been dissolved “per Mayor Ron Shinnick.” It told people who need help to call a non-emergency county number.
The jobs of the chief and about 10 officers were terminated as of Wednesday morning. Exact reasons haven’t been shared publicly, and townspeople are hoping to get some answers at Friday’s meeting.
Shinnick said he took action because of some comments officers posted on social media. The now-former Sgt. Jeremy May said it involved a complaint that he and other officers had raised about the mayor’s wife Pam Shinnick, who had served as the town clerk.
“This all comes to personal vendetta from the mayor, and I wholeheartedly believe that,” May told WRCB-TV. “We took a stand for transparency, and in result, every one of them has lost their jobs.”
The now-former Cohutta Police Chief Greg Fowler told WRCB that he couldn’t comment in detail as the officers were clearing out the police department and removing equipment from the building this week. The mayor told the station he’s not sure what will happen next.
Phone calls and emails left Friday by The Associated Press for Shinnick and the town’s attorney were not immediately returned.
With no police officers working, the Whitfield County Sheriff’s Office said in a brief statement that deputies will help the townspeople if they need it. Cohutta, just south of the Tennessee line, is about 100 miles (161 kilometers) northwest of Atlanta.
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