Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for January 28, 2021

On January 28, 1733, Georgia’s first colonists celebrated a day of thanksgiving for their safe arrival in Savannah and Chief Tomochichi’s granting them permission to settle on the Yamacraw Bluff.

On January 28, 1943, Governor Ellis Arnall signed a joint resolution of the Georgia House and Senate amending the Georgia Constitution to make the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia a constitutional board and reduce the power of the Governor over the Regents.

The movement to a constitutional board came after the loss of accreditation of all Georgia state higher education institutions for white people. The previous Governor, Eugene Talmadge, had engineered the firing of UGA’s Dean of the College of Education; after the Board of Regents initially refused to fire the Dean, Talmadge dismissed three members, and replaced them with new appointees who voted for the firing. Talmadge lost the 1942 election to Arnall.

On January 28, 1986, the space shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds after liftoff as many Americans watched on live television. President Ronald Reagan addressed the loss of seven astronauts.

https://youtu.be/gEjXjfxoNXM

Reagan had originally been scheduled to give his State of the Union that evening, but cancelled the speech. His address on the Challenger disaster was written by Peggy Noonan. The speech written by Noonan and delivered by Reagan is ranked as one of the top ten political speeches of the 20th Century.

Happy birthday today to Northwestern University (1851), Yale Daily News (1878), the first daily college newspaper in the country, the United States Coast Guard (1915), and the Lego brick, which was patented on January 28, 1958.

Elvis Presley made his first appearance on television on January 28, 1956 on the Stage Show on CBS.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

The current Adjournment Resolution is House Resolution 31.

Today is Legislative Day 7 and the General Assembly will convene tomorrow for Legislative Day 8.

Monday, February 1 – legislative day 9
Tuesday, February 2 – legislative day 10
Wednesday, February 3 – legislative day 11
Thursday, February 4 – legislative day 12

Monday, February 8 – legislative day 13

Legislative Committee Meetings

12:00 PM Senate Rules Upon Adjournment – 450 CAP
8:00 AM Senate Veterans, Military and Homeland Security – 310 CLOB
10:00 AM Senate FLOOR SESSION (LD7) – Senate Chamber
10:00 AM HOUSE FLOOR SESSION (LD7) – House Chamber
1:00 PM Senate Public Safety – Mezz 1
1:00 PM HOUSE STATE PLANNING AND COMMUNITY AFFAIRS – 406 CLOB HYBRID
1:30 PM HOUSE Judiciary Gunter Subcommittee – 132 CAP HYBRID
2:00 PM HOUSE TRANSPORTATION – 506 CLOB HYBRID
2:15 PM Senate Agriculture and Consumer Affairs – Mezz 1
3:00 PM HOUSE WAYS AND MEANS – 606 CLOB
3:30 PM Senate Regulated Industries and Utilities – 450 CAP

House Rules Calendar

Modified Open Rule

HB 80 – Supplemental appropriations; State Fiscal Year July 1, 2020 -June 30, 2021 (App-Ralston-7th)(Substitute)

The Georgia State House will vote today on the Supplemental Budget for the current year. From the Capitol Beat News Service:

Georgia House budget writers approved a $26.3 billion mid-year state spending plan Wednesday, making few changes to Gov. Brian Kemp’s recommendations while pumping additional funds into education and public health.

With state tax collections stronger than expected amid a global pandemic, the governor is asking for $567 million to restore a large portion of the K-12 education cuts the General Assembly imposed in the current budget. The mid-year budget will cover state spending through June 30.

Kemp’s fiscal 2021 mid-year budget request also reflects a large influx of federal aid through last year’s Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act to help the Georgia Department of Public Health with COVID-19 testing and vaccinations.

The House Appropriations Committee added $18 million to the mid-year budget Wednesday to buy a new public health surveillance system to help measure the state’s progress in vaccinating Georgians against the virus.

Other significant additions to the mid-year budget the committee approved Wednesday include a plan to use existing funds for 10% pay raises for the state’s corrections officers, a move aimed at stemming the loss of trained officers to higher-paying jobs.

The committee agreed with Kemp’s recommendations to spend $20 million to expand broadband connectivity in rural Georgia and put $1 million toward tourism marketing to help the hospitality industry recover from pandemic-related losses.

Governor Brian Kemp announced yesterday that Georgia will receive an increased allotment of vaccine doses from the federal government. From a press release:

Today, the federal government announced that Georgia will begin receiving 25,000+ more COVID-19 vaccines weekly. This is a 16% increase from the previous allotment of 120,000 doses each week, bringing the new weekly total to 145,900 doses.

“Thanks to the Trump administration and Operation Warp Speed, the vaccine was created and made available to Georgians in record speed. Today, the Biden Administration announced that Georgia will receive an increased weekly allocation, totaling 145,900 doses. Although we still expect demand to far exceed supply for the foreseeable future, this is no doubt welcome news, and we will work around the clock to get these vaccines distributed and safely administered as quickly as possible,” said Governor Brian Kemp.

On a record high day, Georgia reported that 71,307 additional vaccines have been administered. The state has distributed 56.7% of the total vaccines which have been shipped by the federal government.

From Fox5Atlanta:

“Every little bit helps,” said Gov. Kemp. “I wish it was, you know, 200,000, but we’ll take what they can squeeze out. We’re very appreciative of that. We’ll immediately put that into the supply chain and into our different networks.”

The governor said he thinks Georgians will see a difference when looking for vaccine appointments.

“I think people will notice that in some ways because we’re being able to redeploy 40,000 doses that were going to nursing homes, plus this additional 25,000, which is about 16%, will be helpful, no doubt about it. It gets us moving through the 1A expanded criteria quicker than we were a couple of days ago,” Kemp explained.

Gov. Kemp also pushed back on calls by some school board members and superintendents to have the state prioritize teachers for the vaccines.

“We just don’t have the availability of vaccine,” said Gov. Kemp. “We know that people over 65 years of age are more susceptible to having a bad outcome with this virus or even the worst case and that’s death […] I know for myself I wouldn’t want to put myself ahead of a first responder, a nurse or a doctor or medical professional that is literally on the frontlines of COVID-19. And I wouldn’t want to put them in front of someone like my mom or Marty’s mom that if they get this, it can be a death sentence to them.”

Kemp called it “pandemic politics.”

Governor Kemp spoke to WABE about his reelection next year:

“I’m looking forward to running on my record,” Kemp said in an interview with WABE.

“I know I’m going to be able to look in the face of Georgia voters and say that I made the best decisions that I could with the information that I had,” Kemp said of his tenure in office governing during a pandemic.

“One of the hardest things that I had to get across to people in 2018 is that the race was going to be very close because a lot of people in certain parts of the state didn’t believe that,” he said.

“[Democrats] have gotten very good at that ground game,” he said, but pointed out Republicans in other states have also had success with that strategy.

“I certainly paid attention to that. And it’s something that we’ll be working on going into 2022.”

Kemp said Republicans need to “do a better job of doing two things: we’ve got to get more like-minded people registered and participating in the process and getting the vote out and making sure we’re not leaving anybody at home.”

Georgia State Senator John Albers (R-Alpharetta) introduced Senate Bill 6, the “Tax Credit Return on Investment Act of 2021” legislation to audit some state programs, according to the Capitol Beat News Service via the Savannah Morning News.

The bill, introduced by state Sen. John Albers, R-Roswell, would appoint outside auditors to scrutinize the chosen tax programs on request from certain General Assembly committee heads. It passed the state Senate last February but was sidelined by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“This is a great opportunity for us to look at [tax credits] that are performing well … and others that may need to be tweaked or changed,” Albers told the state Senate Finance Committee Wednesday.

The revived audit bill comes as the committee looks to possibly clamp down on lucrative tax credits and exemptions in Georgia that supporters say attract economic activity and opponents argue diminishes the state’s already-tight revenues.

State Sen. Chuck Hufstetler, R-Rome, an anesthetist who has chaired the Finance Committee since mid-2019, has set his sights on taxes like the state’s tobacco levy to give lawmakers an alternative for drumming up new revenue instead of cutting spending during tough economic times.

The Georgia Senate Judiciary Committee approved Senate Bill 9 by Sen. Lee Anderson (R-Grovetown) to split the Augusta Judicial Circuit, according to the Augusta Chronicle.

Sen. Lee Anderson’s bill, SB 9, calls for the creation of a separate judicial circuit for Columbia County. During the late afternoon hearing Wednesday, available by livestream, Anderson, R-Grovetown, described the current composition of the Superior Court bench — with three judges who live in Columbia County and four who live in Richmond County — as perfect for the split.

The bill would leave Richmond and Burke counties in the Augusta Judicial Circuit. It would require all three counties to continue to pay the Superior Court judges, retired judges, and the district attorneys the same supplements they receive now in addition to their state-paid salaries.

The short timetable for the split, to begin July 1, could be accomplished if the bill is passed and the governor signs it early, [State Rep. Barry] Fleming said. That would give the court staff time to reassign cases to the judges, get a new district attorney appointed by the governor and have new staff hired by the district attorney and public defender’s office for Columbia County.

Senate Bill 29 by State Senator Jason Anavitarte (R-Paulding) would add requirements for two forms of photo ID to absentee voting requests, according to the AJC.

Georgia voters would be required to make copies of their photo ID and mail them to election officials twice before being allowed to cast an absentee ballot, according to a bill introduced Wednesday.

The legislation, Senate Bill 29, would create a photo ID requirement for voting outside of polling places in Georgia. Voters would need to submit ID both when applying for absentee ballots and when returning them.

The bill is the first major proposal to limit absentee voting after Republican Donald Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden in last year’s presidential election. State and local election officials have said there’s little indication of fraud besides isolated cases.

Fair Fight, a voting rights group, said Republicans are trying to increase their chances of winning elections by preventing eligible Georgians from casting ballots.

“By requiring access to a printer, which many Georgians obviously do not have, Republicans are attempting to purposely take away the ability of many Georgians to vote by mail simply because they believe too many Democrats and too many people of color voted by mail,” Fair Fight spokesman Seth Bringman said.

The idea of mandating some form of photo ID has the support of powerful Republicans in Georgia, including Gov. Brian Kemp, Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan and House Speaker David Ralston.

Under the legislation, Georgia voters would be required to submit a photocopy of their driver’s license, voter ID card, U.S. passport, government employee ID, military ID card or tribal identification card. Members of the military and overseas voters would be exempt from having to return photo ID.

What could go wrong with that?