Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for August 20, 2024

On August 20, 1781, General George Washington sent Continental troops from New York toward Yorktown, Virginia to engage British troops under Gen. Cornwallis.

On August 20, 1906, Gov. Joseph Terrell signed legislation to build a statue of Georgia founding father James Oglethorpe in Savannah and a bill to build a statue of former Confederate General and Georgia Governor John B. Gordon at the State Capitol.

The Georgia Department of Archives and History was created by legislation signed by Georgia Governor Hugh Dorsey on August 20, 1918.

On August 20, 1920, the American Professional Football Association, which would later be renamed the National Football League, was formed in Akron, Ohio.

On August 20, 1923, Georgia Governor Clifford Walker signed legislation requiring state schools teach the United States and Georgia Constitutions and students pass an exam on the documents before being allowed to graduate.

On August 20, 1965, “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones was released in the UK.

On August 20, 1974, President Gerald Ford nominated Nelson Rockefeller as Vice President of the United States.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Governor Brian Kemp announced three appointments – a Superior Court Judge, a District Attorney, and a Solicitor General, according to a Press Release.

Governor Brian P. Kemp today announced the following appointments:

Sarah Griffie to the Superior Court of the Piedmont Judicial Circuit, filling a vacancy created by the resignation of Judge Wayne D. McLocklin;

Robert Lane as the District Attorney of the Paulding Judicial Circuit to fill the vacancy created by the appointment of Matt Rollins to the Superior Court of the Paulding Judicial Circuit;

and Bradley L. Collins as the Solicitor of Charlton County to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of Patrick Brooks.

Sarah Griffie currently serves as the Chief Assistant District Attorney of the Piedmont Judicial Circuit. She has spent her entire legal career devoted to law enforcement and prosecution in Barrow, Jackson, and Banks counties. During her time as a prosecutor, she has handled thousands of cases, but primarily focused her trial work on violent and sexual crimes against women and children. She started in the Barrow County District Attorney’s Office as a UGA Prosecution Clinic intern in 2006. In 2007, she was hired as an assistant district attorney in Barrow County. She has been the Chief Assistant District Attorney since 2016. Prior to attending law school, she was a commercial banker. She is active in her community, currently serving on the board of the Crawford Long Museum in Jefferson, Georgia. She is a recent graduate of the Jackson County Chamber of Commerce Leadership program, member of the Barrow Area Rotary Club, member of the Barrow County Chamber of Commerce, ex-officio board member of Treehouse Child Advocacy Center, member of the Barrow County School System Law and Public Safety Advisory Committee, mock trial coach at Jefferson High School, and a yearly speaker for the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office choices program. Griffie graduated magna cum laude from High Point University with a degree in International Business and a minor in French. She earned her law degree from the University of Georgia where she graduated cum laude. She and her husband, Andrew, live in Jefferson with their two daughters.

Robert S. Lane currently serves as a Senior Assistant District Attorney in the Paulding Judicial Circuit. Before his service with the District Attorney’s Office, Lane was the Deputy Executive Director and General Counsel for the Georgia State Ethics Commission. Lane began his legal career in Paulding County, where he served as the staff attorney for Paulding Superior Court Judges Kenneth G. Vinson and James R. Osborne. He also spent three years as an associate attorney with the firm of Henrickson & Sereebutra in Dallas, Georgia. Lane has successfully argued numerous cases before the Georgia Supreme Court and Georgia Court of Appeals. He has also served as a Special Master for the Paulding County Superior Court. A native of Georgia, Lane graduated cum laude from the University of Georgia and earned his law degree from the University of Georgia School of Law. He and his wife, Erin, and their daughter reside in Dallas, Georgia and are active members of St. James Episcopal Church.

Bradley L. Collins is the owner and founder of The Collins Law Group, P.C. in Waycross, Georgia. His legal practice is comprised predominantly of trial work and focuses on general civil litigation, domestic relations, criminal defense, and personal injury. Collins is also a registered general civil and domestic mediator. Prior to his appointment as solicitor general in Charlton County, Collins served as a municipal court judge in Nahunta and Hoboken, Georgia. He is also the county attorney for Brantley County, Georgia, and previously served as the District Attorney for the six counties which comprise the Waycross Judicial Circuit. Collins earned his associate’s degree in wildlife management from Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College, his bachelors of arts in political science from Valdosta State University, and his law degree from Florida Coastal School of Law. Collins resides in Waycross, Georgia with his wife, Danielle, who is a Nurse Practitioner and Assistant Professor at South Georgia State College, and their two sons.

The Piedmont Judicial Circuit serves Banks, Barrow, and Jackson Counties; the Paulding Judicial circuit serves Paulding County; and the Charlton County Solicitor General prosecutes misdemeanors in Charlton County State Court and is elected in a partisan primary.

If the Governor had also appointed a Supreme Court Justice and Court of Appeals Judge, he’d be holding a Royal Flush.

From AccessWDUN:

[Ms. Sarah] Griffie, who previously served as the county’s Chief Assistant District Attorney, fills the role vacated by former Judge Wayne McLocklin, who retired this summer.

Barrow County Board of Commissioners congratulated Griffie in a release Monday.

“We as a commission would like to offer our congratulations to Judge Griffie, who underwent a rigorous application process,”  Pat Graham, Barrow County Commission Chairman, said. “We are confident she will work tirelessly for the citizens of Barrow County in her new role.”

Griffie has served in Barrow County since 2007.

Vice Presidential candidate JD Vance (R-OH) will speak in the parking lot of the Lowndes County Jail on Thursday, according to the Valdosta Daily Times.

The vice presidential candidate will speak at the Lowndes County Sheriff’s Office, located at the jail complex at 120 Prison Farm Road, at 1 p.m., said Sheriff Ashley Paulk.

The rally is expected to draw about 400 people and will take place in the jail’s parking lot, the sheriff said.

“There will be security on hand,” he said. On July 13, there was an assassination attempt against Trump that failed at a campaign rally in Butler, Penn.

The Trump-Vance campaign website describes the Valdosta stopover as “an Immigration Event” under a general day-long campaign theme of “Make America Secure Again.”

Vance will be campaigning in Valdosta the same day Trump’s expected election rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, is expected to accept the Democratic nomination for president in Chicago.

This is only Valdosta’s latest moment on the national elections stage. In 2016, presidential candidate Trump visited the city and appeared in a rally that gained national headlines when several black attendees claimed they were removed from the gathering; the police chief at the time, Brian Childress, said the decision about the ejection was made by Trump’s staff.

In 2020, in the days after losing the presidential election, President Trump was back in town on Air Force One, stumping for Republican Senate candidates facing runoffs.

The Catoosa County Board of Education proposed a more than 30% property tax hike, according to the Walker County Messenger and The Catoosa County News.

With standing room only for the third time, and 61 people signed up to speak, the Catoosa County school board held its last hearing about its proposal to raise residential property taxes 30.14% to help cover expenses for its 2024-25 budget.

The last two hearings were dominated by people objecting to higher school taxes. This most recent one was dominated by teachers, most of whom praised the school system and defended its need to raise taxes.

Superintendent Chance Nix, in a talk before public comments, discussed the issue of unfunded mandates from the state and the state promising certain funds but not actually delivering. One example, he said: The state promises funds for bussing but usually doesn’t provide those funds. Some school systems, Nix said, simply don’t offer bussing under such circumstances.

Nix said 90% of the school system’s budget is personnel. Catoosa schools have a total of 1,721 employees. Of those, 905 are funded by the state. More than 800 are funded by local taxes.

One speaker said she had arranged to speak with District 3 state Rep. Mitchell Horner (R-Ringgold) about the state’s role in the problem. She also said she wants to see the school tax exemption age lowered from 75 to 65 and exemptions made for those on disability and those making under a certain amount of money.

A local resident crunched some numbers and presented the following at the hearing: “Using the average stats for taxation on a $275,000 home, “$1,600 of [the tax bill] goes to the school system. The median household income in Catoosa County is $65,000 or less a year. … the per capita income in Catoosa County for 2023 was $35,000.

“For that single property owner, it will take 79% of one month’s net income to pay for the average school taxes. So please understand that $383 [average hike in school taxes if the millage rate remains the same] is a lot of money to some of us. And I haven’t even given you the people who are at true poverty level in Catoosa County.”

“The raw data download average teacher salary in Catoosa County is almost $62,000 – not the $42,000 we were led to believe at the first meeting. The context was misleading. This is difficult all the way around.”

The Bibb County Board of Education will host public meetings about a proposed property tax increase, according to 13WMAZ.

While Macon-Bibb County is looking to reduce property taxes, the Bibb County Board of Education is hoping to bring more in property taxes next year.

Mayor Lester Miller says they’ll be cutting the county’s millage rate to 9.9 for FY2024. Last year’s millage rate was 10.7.

The county and the school system have two separate millage rates.

During a Monday night meeting, the Board of Education voted on a tentative millage rate: 14.674. That’s the same rate as last year.

However, based on the overall increase in property values, the average Bibb County homeowner will likely see a property tax increase going toward the Bibb County School District.

If you own a $200,000 home, the district says you’d expect to see an additional $60 tacked on to your property tax bill compared to last year.

The tentative millage rate is 14.674. The rollback millage rate, 13.886, is the millage rate that would bring in the same amount of property taxes compared to the year before.

The district says that the additional funds, which would add roughly $4.32 million to the budget, could help support programs along with possibly bolster salaries to better compete with surrounding districts.

The State Election Board passed rule changes for the second time, according to the Capitol Beat News Service.

For the second time this month, the Republican-controlled State Election Board approved a change to Georgia’s election rules critics say could make it easier to delay the official vote count this fall.

The change, which passed 3-2, requires local election officials to submit to the secretary of state a report reconciling the total number of ballots cast in each precinct with the total number of voters who received credit for voting before election results can be certified.

The rules change’s supporters on the board argued local election officials should have the right to a hand recount of votes before they sign a legal affidavit certifying an election. The board’s three Republican members made the same argument earlier this month when the board voted 3-2 to require election officials to conduct a “reasonable inquiry” into whether votes have been counted accurately before they certify election results.

Board member Janice Johnston described the rules changes as a way to strengthen the integrity of the elections process by encouraging accuracy and fairness.

But opponents warned the rules changes could set the stage for Republicans in Georgia to sow chaos following the November presidential election if former President Donald Trump fails to carry the state’s 16 electoral votes.

“Trump and his MAGA allies have taken over the Georgia State Election Board to try and give a veneer of legality to their illegal scheme to disrupt the certification of Georgia’s 2024 election results,” said Lauren Groh-Wargo, CEO of Fair Fight, a voting-rights organization founded by two-time Democratic gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams. “It’s all with the goal of helping Trump win the Peach State, even if he doesn’t earn a majority of Georgians’ votes.”

Board member Sara Tindall Ghazal, the only Democratic appointee on the board, said it’s too late in the 2024 election cycle for the board to be considering changing the rules. County election offices already have begun accepting applications for absentee ballots, she said.

Others questioned the legal authority of the board to make such changes without the approval of the General Assembly.

“To safeguard our elections, we urge the State Election Board to operate with full transparency and in accordance with Georgia law,” wrote the Democracy Defense Project, a bipartisan group formed recently by former Govs. Nathan Deal and Roy Barnes, former U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss, and former Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin.

“Making substantive changes to the way votes are counted and certified without legislative action will undoubtedly foster chaos and undermine the confidence that Georgians have in the democratic process. Integrity and foresight must supersede partisanship and haste in the weeks ahead.”

But board member Janelle King, who voted for the rules changes, said most of the opposition has come from those who have warned about potential negative consequences that have yet to occur. She said she’s concerned about discrepancies in vote totals that she said did occur during the 2020 election cycle.

“There were issues. There are (local election) boards that are not confident,” King said. “It’s important that we address what we know occurred.”

From the Associated Press via WRDW:

Three members of the board who were called out by name by former President Trump during a campaign rally in Atlanta earlier this month as “pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency and victory” voted to approve it. The nonpartisan board chair and the lone Democrat on the panel voted against it.

Trump continues to assert without proof that the 2020 election in Georgia was stolen from him through widespread voter fraud, and his supporters say new rules are needed to safeguard against fraud or errors. But Democrats and some election integrity organizations fear Trump-aligned county election board members could use new rules to try to slow or halt the certification of elections if they don’t like the result.

The rule adopted Monday requires county election officials to generate lists of voters who cast ballots in an election, categorized by voting method, and to examine them for duplicates. After any discrepancies have been investigated and resolved as required by law, all returns “which are entitled to be counted” shall be recorded and verified as accurate.

The rule also requires county officials to meet by 3 p.m. on the Friday after an election to review precinct returns — that’s before the 5 p.m. Friday deadline for overseas and military ballots to be returned and for any issues with provisional or absentee ballots to be rectified by voters. And it says county election officials “shall be permitted to examine all election related documentation created during the conduct of elections” before they certify results.

Monday’s rule approval follows the adoption earlier this month of a rule requiring county election officials to make a “reasonable inquiry” before certifying results. But that rule didn’t define what that means.

Certification was long an administrative process that garnered little attention, but some conservative election officials have tried to block certification in recent years.

Monday’s rule was submitted by Bridget Thorne, who is a Fulton County commissioner but said she proposed the rule as a private citizen. She told the State Election Board that it is a “common-sense rule” that “simply offers guidance on following the existing law.” She said it would help prevent ballots from not being counted or being counted more than once.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, the American Civil Liberties Union of Georgia and Public Rights Project said in a joint statement Monday that the rule “would illegally broaden county election board members’ authority prior to election certification, under the guise of transparency.”

Allowing county election board members to examine “all election related documentation” exceeds the State Election Board’s rulemaking authority, invites abuse and could create unreasonable burdens for election workers in the hectic period leading up to certification, the statement says.

Sara Tindall Ghazal, the election board’s lone Democrat, said it is “absolutely critical that every vote is accounted for.”

“My concern is that some of the language that’s being used is suggesting that superintendents have discretion to determine which votes are counted, and that is not the case,” she said. “The statute does not support that.”

Board Chair John Fervier said the wording could lead to an “unlimited search of documents” that could allow county board members to say they won’t certify because they haven’t received a certain document.

Fervier said he’s also concerned that the board is exceeding its authority and that the rule “kind of redefines the certification process.” Those types of definitions should be left up to state lawmakers, he said.

The Senate Study Committee on Veterans’ Mental Health and Housing meets Wednesday, according to the Rome News Tribune.

On Wednesday at 10 a.m. the Senate Study Committee on Veterans’ Mental Health and Housing, chaired by Sen. Chuck Payne, R–Dalton, will hold its third hearing at the Georgia Military College, 201 E. Greene St. in Milledgeville.

This event is open to the public and will be livestreamed on the Senate website (https://www.legis.ga.gov/schedule/senate).

The meeting will include testimony from key stakeholders regarding the status of veterans’ mental health in Georgia. The committee was created to evaluate the adequacy of Georgia’s public and private programs and services for providing resources to veterans. The committee will recommend additional measures to ensure Georgia veterans and their families have the support they need to thrive after their military service ends.

Floyd County Republicans held their Tillman Rally and the Rome News Tribune has photos.