Piedmont softball managed a doubleheader split against No. 19 Berry in a Wednesday afternoon non-conference road doubleheader picking up a win in game one. The Lions earned an 8-3 win over the Vikings before dropping game two 7-5.
Piedmont’s game one victory marked the first time the Vikings had lost at home since April 16, 2022.
Game 1: Piedmont 8, Berry 3
The Lions were undeterred by an early three-run deficit, responding with eight unanswered runs to stun the Vikings in game one.
Berry jumped ahead with a three-run blast in the first inning and held that lead into the third. Jordyn Green led off the frame with the first of her three hits, but was still standing on first base after a pair of strikeouts.
That set the stage for standout freshman Mandi Peretti, who delivered a two-run homer to immediately get Piedmont back in the game.
Still trailing by a run in the top of the fifth, again it was Green who got the rally started, this time with a one-out single. After a Kennedy Votava bunt single and a double steal to put two in scoring position, the Lions took advantage of Berry’s lone error of the game to plate the tying run.
That turned the lineup over to Peretti, who delivered again with the go-ahead single.
Clinging to a one-run lead, Piedmont took advantage of its last chance to add on, scoring four times to build a five-run cushion for the final three outs. Green led off with her third single of the game. With two outs, four consecutive RBI base hits from Peretti, Maddi Spieks, Jasmine Lowery and Addy Perkins gave Piedmont the 8-3 advantage.
That was more than enough for starting pitcher Megan Steinmeyer, who finished off the complete game by stranding two Vikings runners on base to close the door.
Game 2: Berry 7, Piedmont 5
The Lions struck first in game two with a pair of runs in the first but the Vikings fired back immediately as the two were tied at two after one.
Berry’s barrage began in the third inning as they scored five runs on five hits forcing Piedmont starter Taylor Spivey from the game. Summer McCranie entered in relief but the Vikings took a 7-2 lead at that point.
Piedmont was not out of it as they rallied in the seventh once more with three runs helped by a pair of walks and an error, but the Vikings escaped with the win to avoid a Piedmont sweep.
STANDOUT PERFORMERS:
– Mandi Peretti recorded four RBI in game one including a two run home run.
– Kennedy Votava was the lone Lion with more than a single hit in game two as she was 2-for-3.
INSIDE THE BOX SCORE:
– Piedmont won 13 in a row before dropping game two of the doubleheader.
The Precision Rifle team went to Anniston, AL on Saturday, and came away with gold and silver medals. All five members of the team shot in the 3×20 match.
Senior Leah Rogers fired a 589 (personal best) out of 600 possible points, and only three points behind the school record. She earned a gold medal. Fellow senior Chloe Erwin was second with a 579.
Junior Mitchell McGahee shot a 571, placing fourth overall. 8th-grader Faith Stout tied her PR of 568 in only her second match, placing sixth. Meredith Maxwell competed in her first match and finished with a 504.
Rogers’ next match will be April 13-15 at the National Junior Olympic Championships.
Tallulah Falls Middle School girls golf. (TFS Athletics)
Tallulah Falls MS golf closed its season at the North Georgia State Invitational at Arrowhead Pointe in Elberton.
The Lady Indians won the inaugural event with a team total of 139. Maeve Hatcher was low medalist with a 45, while Sadie Henslee (46) and Handley James (48) were close behind. The Lady Indians finished the season with an 8-0 match record.
The 8th-graders completed an undefeated middle school career with three Tallulah Falls Middle School Championship victories as well as the North Georgia State Invitational title.
“The future is extremely bright for this group of young ladies,” says coach Jadie Hatcher.
The Indians finished an incredible year with strong performances from Maddox English (40), Owen Earp (43), and Emmitt Likens (49).
The Indians had a 6-2 record and respectable tournament appearances. The Indians will send four 8th-graders to the varsity level next year, and the middle school team has an extremely solid foundation of younger players to build upon.
“It’s been my honor to work with these young athletes this year,” adds Hatcher.
ATLANTA (Georgia Recorder) — Lawmakers in the Senate concluded the 39th legislative day of the 2025 session in the early hours of Thursday morning by advancing a bill that would ban diversity, equity and inclusion programs or policies from all state public schools and universities.
The bill, which effectively hollowed out legislation originally aimed at increasing sick days and maternity leave for public school teachers, passed in a contentious 33-21 vote, restricting the freedom educational institutions have to discuss racial justice issues even as lawmakers across the hall voted to expand First Amendment protections based on religion only hours before.
House Bill 127’s sponsor in the Senate, Sylvania Republican Sen. Max Burns, argued that the bill was aimed at preventing discrimination in Georgia’s public educational institutions.
“DEI is the antithesis of equality,” Burns said on the Senate floor. “If you believe in equality, if you believe in equal opportunity, this bill does not strip you of that. It enhances it.”
Democrats swiftly condemned the bill, arguing that a ban on DEI would be a return to an era of “state-sponsored discrimination.” They also feared it could be used to censor topics like slavery’s role in the civil war and other ways that race and racism have shaped American history.
“I don’t want to say DEI, I want to talk about diversity, equity and inclusion,” said Derek Mallow, a Savannah Democrat. “If there is a need to ban DEI, then what is the opposite to diversity? Well the opposite to diversity is uniformity, and to be uniform means that you lack any other options for anyone to be different, to look different, to talk different, to walk different, to be different.”
They also proposed a total of 20 amendments — the most on any individual bill in living memory — but all 20 amendments were dismissed without a vote by Lt. Gov. Burt Jones.
“This is a sad day for the Georgia state Senate, one of the saddest I’ve ever been in in 10 years, quite frankly,” said Senate Minority Leader Harold Jones II, an Augusta Democrat.
“This doesn’t represent the people of Georgia,” he continued. “Tonight was a night the Republican Party said they’re going to take Georgia backwards — backwards to days when people did not have full rights.”
The bill now returns to the House, which must agree to the Senate’s amendments before the bill can advance to the governor’s desk.
A driver suffered a gunshot wound to the head as he traveled down Harper’s Ferry Road in Elbert County Wednesday, April 2, after a man allegedly attempted to shoot a dog in front of his home.
According to the Elbert County Sheriff’s Office, deputies responded to the scene and found the victim seated beside his truck as he held a towel to his head to control the bleeding.
Authorities say the truck’s driver-side window had a bullet hole, and the victim reported that something shattered his window before striking him in the head.
As deputies investigated, a man at the scene – identified as Jermaine Hamm – allegedly admitted to firing a gun. Hamm then allegedly told deputies he had been shooting at a dog from his porch.
Following Hamm to his residence, according to police, officers determined he had been firing a .22 rifle toward the roadway. Investigators allegedly discovered multiple bullet holes in trees, a children’s slide, a fence and a building across the street, all in the line of fire.
Hamm was arrested and charged with reckless conduct, discharging a firearm within 50 yards of a public highway and discharging a firearm while under the influence of alcohol or drugs.
The victim was transported by Elbert County EMS to a trauma center with non-life-threatening injuries.
Sen. Ed Setzler holds a RFRA rally the day before his bill passed the House. (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
ATLANTA (Georgia Recorder) — On the penultimate day of the 2025 legislative session, some religious Georgians had their prayers answered.
A so-called religious freedom bill is on Gov. Brian Kemp’s desk after the House approved it 96-70 along mostly party lines late Wednesday night.
A Georgia Religious Freedom Restoration Act, or RFRA bill, has been a goal of the Georgia GOP since shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in 2015.
Senate Bill 36 by Acworth Republican Sen. Ed Setzler places restrictions on state and local governments’ ability to “substantially burden a person’s exercise of religion” unless it is “in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest” and even then only if they use the “least restrictive means of furthering such compelling governmental interest.”
Cedartown Republican Rep. Trey Kelley said that means religious Georgians will have their rights protected from state and local governments the same way they are protected from the federal government under the First Amendment. A federal version passed in 1993.
“What this measure simply looks to do is codify the same balancing test for our exercise of religious freedom that the other four First Amendment rights have,” he said. “This should be something that we can agree to. We got a lot we can fight about. This should be something we can agree to.”
Rep. Ruwa Romman argues against the RFRA bill. (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
Democrats largely disagreed.
Opponents like Duluth Democratic Rep. Ruwa Romman say the bill would amount to a license to discriminate against those religious minorities and LGBTQ Georgians.
“I think a lot about what if a Muslim woman who wears a headscarf is in a workplace and her boss decides to fire her because it offends his faith?” said Romman, who is Muslim. “What if, for example, somebody is praying, takes five minutes to pray during the day, and their boss says, ‘you know what, you don’t believe in Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior and I’m going to fire you. It is my business, I should be able to do that.’ And to some extent, there are already allowances for that to begin with. To me, the negatives far outweigh any potential benefits”
Democrats attempted to add an amendment to the effect that the law could not be used to discriminate but Republicans rejected it.
The state’s only currently-serving Jewish lawmaker, Sandy Springs Democratic Rep. Esther Panitch, said the law could allow discrimination against Jews if it came from a sincere religious belief.
Panitch said determining the motivation of antisemitic acts would mean more work for courts.
Rep. Esther Panitch debates the RFRA bill. (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
“Each case will require an extensive analysis of whether antisemitic expression is truly motivated by sincere religious beliefs,” she said. “The result is that secular antisemitism faces consequences while religiously motivated antisemitism receives protections.”
Both Romman and Panitch predicted RFRA could mean religious carveouts to the state’s abortion law. Panitch said Jews believe life begins at birth rather than at conception as state law says, and Romman said Islam prioritizes saving the life of a mother and the RFRA bill would make it impossible to live out that mandate.
Avondale Estates Democratic Rep. Karla Drenner, who became the Legislature’s first openly-LGBTQ member when she took office in 2001, read from the speech she read opposing a RFRA bill in 2016.
“I must note that the irony of debating the bill that licenses prejudice against my community in the city too busy to hate is not lost on me,” she said. “I oppose – back then it was House Bill 757, today it’s Senate Bill 36 – I oppose it for any number of reasons. It says that my rights under the constitution, under the law and under God are not inalienable but rather are subject to the opinions of others.”
In a surprise move, Republican Gov. Nathan Deal vetoed that year’s RFRA bill.
Drenner also took a swipe at a slate of red meat bills she suggested were signs of weakness in the GOP.
“This year, we have let the other chamber that’s running for governor run our chamber over here, from my perspective,” she said. “We’ve done all these terrible bills, from my perspective.”
Rep. Karla Drenner speaks against the RFRA bill. (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
Republican representatives took the opposite view.
“I got a little frustrated over there when I was listening, this is dealing with government burdening the free exercise of religion in this state,” said Bremen Republican Rep. Tyler Paul Smith. “This is not a license for a private citizen to use this against another private citizen.”
Dawsonville Republican Rep. Will Wade said the measure will reaffirm Georgians’ bedrock religious freedoms.
“Senate Bill 36 simply gives people of all faiths, all faiths, their day in court if they believe the government has overreached,” he said. “Over half of the states – we’ve heard it today, 39 now, we can be the 40th – It is time that Georgia provide the same safeguards that 39 other states in our country have for their citizens. We are a state very rich in diversity, I think that’s what makes it better.”
Kemp has 40 days from Friday to sign, and has indicated he will do so.
“I want to congratulate those who worked for the passage of SB 36,” he said in a statement. “I have always maintained that I would support and sign a version of RFRA which mirrors the language and protections provided by federal law since 1993. My commitment to that promise and to the deeply held beliefs of Georgians of faith remains unwavering. I also want to assure those of differing views that Georgia remains a welcoming place to live, work, and raise a family.“
The former equine area at Lee Arrendale Prison off GA 365 (Daniel Purcell/Now Habersham)
A large piece of prime real estate off GA 365 has been identified as the potential future location of Habersham County’s next business park, if an authorized transaction of state-owned property is carried out by lawmakers.
The 200-acre parcel, currently owned by the Georgia Department of Corrections (GDC), is part of what was once known as Lee Arrendale State Prison’s equine impound area, where inmates once rehabilitated injured horses in partnership with the state’s Department of Agriculture.
House Resolution 97, if approved at the state level and signed into law by Gov. Brian Kemp, could allow Habersham County’s Commission to move to purchase that property at 377 Mt. Zion Road and GA 365 in the near future. Action, or at least discussion, likely would first be required by commissioners and the Habersham County Development Authority.
Lee Arrendale’s closure potentially lends land for new business park
The potential property sale to Habersham comes after the GDC recommended closure of Lee Arrendale State Prison in Alto in 2023, though state officials still haven’t provided a timeline for the future transfer of prisoners or when the facility could shut down.
“The GDC will not be transferring the entire population from Lee Arrendale (State Prison) at one time,” Joan Heath, director of communications for GDC said in an email Wednesday, April 2. “Rather, we have been in the process of transferring offenders on an intermittent basis for the past few months. We do not have a definitive date for the final closure of the facility.”
In total, the prison property is 965 acres, with around 276 in Habersham and about 689 in Banks County.
While nothing has officially been decided as of Wednesday, April 2, Georgia Rep. Victor Anderson (R-Cornelia) said future development of a business park on that land remains a “possibility.”
Lee Arrendale State Prison (Daniel Purcell/NowHabersham.com)
State process
If the proposal were checked off by the legislature and the governor, Anderson said talks would likely proceed in that direction.
“All we’ve done is requested the State Properties Commission to include that in this year’s property conveyance bill – to make it available – if Habersham County and/or the (Habersham County) Development Authority, GDC and the State Properties Commission are able to work out any type of arrangement,” Anderson said. “There’s nothing definitive. There’s nothing that is actually going to happen, based on anything down here – except that it’s the first step that would allow those discussions to begin. It would remain a possibility, yes.”
Anderson said portions of available properties along GA 365 also could be released to Habersham County at no-cost for a new fire station through a public safety grant, providing much-needed emergency services on a dangerous corridor.
“Some of that is being looked at as a south section of the county fire station or a potential EMS center there,” he said. “The county has some other options there. I do know part of that discussion would involve, potentially, the development authority and looking at a potential site for their marketing.”
The role of Habersham’s Commission
If it’s approved at the state level, whether an official vote would have to be taken by the Habersham County Commission is still unclear.
“As of right now, there is no documentation or notice of this item being approved by the legislature and governor being presented to either the Board of Commissioners or the Development Authority regarding any properties,” Habersham County spokesperson Ashlyn Brady said via email on behalf of County Attorney Donnie Hunt. “Neither entity has reviewed the legislation nor has entered into any discussion regarding the bill. Right now, it is premature to determine what our officials will do if presented with an announcement from the state.”
The statement went on to say: “As with any potential purchase of land by the (board of commissioners) or development authority, the issue would fall under executive session status until a consensus is reached and then would be voted on in public during regular session upon exiting an executive session of either entity.”
Lee Arrendale State Prison (Daniel Purcell/NowHabersham.com)
Habersham County Commission Vice Chairman Bruce Harkness said he recognizes pros and cons of such a potential decision. Still, he ultimately believes a business or industrial park on GA 365 could lead to “runaway growth.”
“While we need good jobs, once you open up that floodgate of putting in an industrial park in the south end of the county, then I assure you that Pandora’s box will be opened (for industrial growth),” Harkness said. “I was elected by the vast majority of people that warned me to control growth and help maintain our way of life, our culture and our wonderful little slice of heaven here … I know it’s a fine line if we do need good paying jobs, but yet, at the same time, the more industry you bring in, the more it takes away from our small rural county. As long as I’m in office representing the people, I will always fight to maintain our way of life here and fight against uncontrolled runaway growth.”
As of now, Commissioner Ty Akins said he tended to favor a business park in that location, stating a new park could centralize industry to one specific place, instead of scattered throughout the county, and noting new commercial and industrial business could generate revenue and remove existing tax burdens off homeowners.
“That (GA) 365, 441 corridor is where the feedback we’ve gotten from the community, over the years, says: ‘This is going to be an area of growth’…it’s in the right spot – at the south end of the county, right on the corridor and close to Hall County. If we’re going to take any measures of reducing the tax burden on homeowners, this is where that needs to go.”
Who has dibs on water/sewer
Questions remain on which government entity would supply water/sewer services to a potential business park on GA 365.
Currently, Demorest sells water to the prison while Baldwin provides sewer services.
“I would say it stays the same because of the service delivery agreements, so that’s what my belief on the outside looking in would be,” Demorest City Manager Mark Musslewhite said.
Baldwin’s Chief Administrative Officer Emily Woodmaster agreed with Musslewhite’s assessment, stating current service delivery agreements are in place.
The inland port
County officials have long deemed the GA 365 corridor an ideal location for a new business park for its proximity to the Northeast Georgia Inland Port – also known as the Blue Ridge Connector.
A $170 million regional cargo terminal planned at Gateway Industrial Centre off GA 365 and White Sulphur Road, the inland port is expected to bring a trove of industrial/commercial developments, population growth and housing to Habersham in the coming years.
By 2026, the 104-acre inland port, operating within 15 miles of Habersham County’s border, will become a center for semi-trucks to load and unload cargo on and off a 3,000-foot train – which will run to and from Savannah’s harbor via a 324-mile freight service rail line.
Now Habersham reporter Jerry Neace contributed to this article
One person was killed, and three others were injured, including two children, in a single-vehicle wreck in Hart County.
The crash occurred shortly before 4 p.m. Wednesday, April 2, on Lankford Road southeast of Lavonia. Troopers from Georgia State Patrol Post 52 in Hartwell responded to the wreck. They say a Dodge Dakota was traveling south when it left the roadway, spun out, and crashed into a tree.
The driver, 29-year-old Dustin Owen of Lavonia, was seriously injured and was taken to Prisma Healthcare in Greenville, South Carolina.
The front passenger, 22-year-old Brittney Lewis of Lavonia, sustained fatal injuries and was pronounced dead at the scene.
A 1-year-old male and 2-year-old female, who were also passengers in the vehicle, sustained minor injuries and were transported to Prisma Healthcare for evaluation.
The Georgia State Patrol’s Specialized Crash Reconstruction Team responded to the scene to assist with the investigation, which remains ongoing. No charges have been filed at this time.
Mario Stinchcomb was exonerated from a 2002 murder conviction. He recently appeared at a press conference to support a formula for the wrongfully incarcerated to get compensation for lost years. (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
ATLANTA (Georgia Recorder) — The Georgia House passed a bill Wednesday that seeks to overhaul the compensation process allowing the state to pay wrongfully convicted Georgians, a system that has long relied on individual resolutions to pay people who were locked up and later exonerated.
Republican lawmakers in the state House prevailed in a contentious 244-61 vote after legislators spliced itonto a bill aimed at allowing criminal defendants to recoup their legal costs if the prosecuting attorney in their case is disqualified for personal or professional misconduct.
The original wrongful compensation bill, House Bill 533, stalled in the House on Crossover Day, March 7, passing out of the chamber’s Judiciary Non-Civil Committee but never appearing on the floor for a vote. Previous versions of the bill have faced fierce opposition in the Senate, particularly by Sen. Randy Robertson, a Cataula
Sen. Randy Robertson (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
Republican and former law enforcement officer who has repeatedly raised questions about the innocence of convicts who he says could be exonerated by the courts on a legal technicality. But attached to Senate Bill 244, which the bill’s lead sponsor Sen. Brandon Beach said is inspired by President Donald Trump’s election interference case in Georgia, it may face a smoother path to success.
The Genesis of the Wrongful Conviction Compensation Act
As one of only a few states without a designated statute in place to compensate wrongfully convicted citizens, Georgia’s wrongfully incarcerated residents face an uphill battle when attempting to secure compensation.
That’s on top of the already complex, often yearslong process prisoners must undertake in order to get a conviction overturned. Once they’ve secured their freedom, those who have been wrongfully convicted must then find a state representative who is willing to sponsor an individual compensation resolution for them and file a claim with Georgia’s Claims Advisory Board. For any claims over $5,000 — which encompasses most, if not all wrongful conviction cases — the advisory board will then make a recommendation to the legislature, which apportions compensation funds as part of the annual state budget.
“Certainly, this process is not meant for wrongful conviction,” said Maggie Hasty, who oversees claims for the Secretary of State’s office. “It is meant for people who have monetary claims against state agencies.”
Following the Advisory Board’s recommendations, those resolutions then go through the full legislative process and must pass committees and floor votes in both the House and Senate before they can take effect.
Advocates have criticized the current system, arguing that it results in unequal treatment between exonerees and subjects individual compensation resolutions to legislators’ political whims. But under the language in HB 533, sponsored by Rome Republican Rep. Katie Dempsey, the pathway would be streamlined. The bill would establish a new process under Georgia state law for people who have been exonerated, allowing administrative law judges — rather than the Claims Advisory Board — to rule on wrongful conviction compensation cases. It would also award a standardized rate of $75,000 for each year of incarceration to each exoneree, with an additional $25,000 added for each year spent on death row.
For Dempsey, who sponsored two individual compensation resolutions for residents of Floyd County in addition to the Wrongful Conviction Compensation Act, “a wrongful conviction is unimaginable.”
“I often put myself in those shoes — because it could happen to any of us, or our children, or someone we love or care about,” she said, adding, “I wouldn’t last ten minutes in prison and you all know that. I would need a lot more than money to make me whole.”
For the five citizens hoping to seek compensation this year, however, time may already have run out. On Crossover Day, lawmakers combined five individual compensation resolutions into House Resolution 128, which passed overwhelmingly in the House but did not receive a hearing on the Senate side until Tuesday, after the deadline to add it to the Senate calendar had passed. The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Compensation, which Robertson chairs, began its hearing at 6 a.m. on Tuesday morning, ultimately concluding after more than four hours of testimony without a final vote.
“We rush too many things through this building without having legitimate, deep-dive conversations about it,” Robertson said, comparing the combined bill to a “bastard son.”
Democrats split between aiding wrongfully convicted and President Trump
For House Democrats, who have overwhelmingly supported compensating those who are wrongfully convicted in previous bienniums, the marriage between the wrongful conviction act and a bill aimed at compensating President Donald Trump presented a philosophical dilemma.
According to state Sen. Brandon Beach, an Alpharetta Republican and staunch Trump ally who was recently appointed by the president to serve as U.S. Treasurer, SB 244 was directly inspired by Trump’s election interference case in Georgia, in which Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis was disqualified after an appeals court judge found that her romantic relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade created a “‘significant’ appearance of impropriety.” Under SB 244, attorney’s fees and other costs would come out of county prosecutors’ budgets, which Democrats fear could have a disproportionate impact on smaller counties with more limited budgets, and discourage prosecutors from tackling complex or high-profile cases.
In a scathing Minority Report, state Rep. Shea Roberts, an Atlanta Democrat, condemned the combination of the two pieces of legislation.
“I wanted to believe that we were better than this,” she said. “I held out hope that the majority party in this chamber would not use its legislative power for blatant political retribution. And tacking the Wrongfully Incarcerated Compensation bipartisan bill that our colleagues have worked tirelessly to pass for years onto this punitive SB 244 makes me physically sick.”
The bill would also directly benefit a sitting legislator: Sen. Shawn Still, a Johns Creek Republican, was indicted in the Fulton County election interference case alongside Trump and 17 other codefendants. If the bill passes, he too may be able to recoup the cost of his legal fees.
But state Rep. Scott Holcomb, an Atlanta Democrat who sponsored two previous versions of the Wrongful Conviction Compensation Act, urged his colleagues to vote in favor of the bill.
Rep. Scott Holcomb (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
The current compensation process “has been candidly broken for a very, very long time,” he said. “What it leads to is inconsistent results: some people get compensation, some people don’t. Some people get a certain amount of compensation, some people get less, some people get more.”
He also highlighted the repeated issues he’s faced getting the Senate to consider any form of compensation for the wrongfully convicted.
“What’s happened since 2022 is no resolutions have moved, period, in the senate,” he said. “They haven’t entertained them, they haven’t considered them. Last year they didn’t even have hearings for measures that were passed here.”
Though the vast majority of Democrats voted against the bill, Holcomb and Dempsey are optimistic that combining the two bills will improve their chances of establishing change by the end of the 2025 legislative session.
“I don’t like being sideways with the majority of my caucus,” Holcomb said after the bill passed on the House floor. “But at the same token, when all is said and done, and when I leave this building for good, there’s going to be very few things that I’ve worked on that will have been incredibly consequential. This will be one of them, and so I had to continue to support it, and I’ll continue to support it, and I really hope that it gets to the finish line this year.”
The legislation now returns to the Senate, which must agree to the amended House version before the bill can advance to the governor’s desk.
Lawmakers are already largely exempted from the Open Records Act, but the proposal would go further in restricting access in a late-emerging proposal that bypassed the usual committee process. (John McCosh/Georgia Recorder)
ATLANTA (Georgia Recorder) — A late-emerging proposal in the Georgia Legislature would limit what the public can access in police reports and communications with state lawmakers.
The proposed changes to Georgia’s Open Records Act were tacked onto another bill, Senate Bill 12, late in the day Wednesday in the gatekeeping House Rules Committee, bypassing the usual legislative committee process and shortcutting public debate on the measure.
Under the new proposal, police departments would be able to shield almost all information about officers’ stops, arrests and incident responses, says Sarah Brewerton-Palmer, executive director with the Georgia First Amendment Foundation.
Additionally, the bill would create broad new exemptions to prevent public disclosure of the General Assembly’s activities, including communication with other parts of state government, she said.
Lawmakers are already largely exempted from the Open Records Act, but the proposal would go further in restricting access, adding records and data prepared for legislators to the list of off-limits information to the public.
“This is no time to weaken Georgia’s transparency laws, and it would be particularly inappropriate to do so this way — by tacking lengthy amendments onto a bill in the final days of the session, with no opportunity for public comment,” Brewerton-Palmer said.
The bill was changed and advanced out of the House Rules Committee meeting over the objections of Democrats who questioned the sudden urgency and raised concerns about how broad the proposed changes are.
“I’m a little bit concerned that nobody knows where this came from, and what is the urgency that brings us here on the 39th day at this hour?” said House Minority Leader Carolyn Hugley of Columbus during the 7 p.m. meeting.
Rep. Rob Leverett, an Elberton Republican, described the changes as meant to “clean up” aspects of Georgia’s Open Records Act while there was a related bill on the move. The original bill had aimed to clarify that records requests should be filed with government agencies that created the need for the record and not private contractors or vendors – a response to a Georgia Supreme Court ruling last fall.
The bill was quickly sent back to the House Rules Committee but remains in play for Friday, which is the last day of the 2025 legislative session.
FILE PHOTO - Georgia State Election Board Chairman John Fervier, far right, and Democratic Board Member Sara Tindall Ghazal, far left, cast votes at the Friday Sept. 20, board meeting opposing a new rule mandating the hand counting of ballots cast at each polling place on Election Day. The rule was passed with the support of conservative board member Janelle King, second from left. (Ross Williams/Georgia Recorder)
ATLANTA (Georgia Recorder) — A pair of election bills the Georgia Senate passed Wednesday propose new State Election Board powers, remove Georgia from multi-state voter rolls sharing databases and allow voters to request hand-marked paper ballots.
The Senate voted along party lines Wednesday for the sweeping voting rules changes proposed in House Bill 397 as well as Senate Bill 214, which aims to encourage voters to use pencils or pens to complete ballots instead of electronic voting machines as is the primary option now.
Sen. Jason Esteves, an Atlanta Democrat, criticized plans in the bill sponsored by Rep. Tim Fleming, a Covington Republican, that would force the state to withdraw from the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC), a system that backers including Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger contend helps Georgia maintain more accurate voter rolls by sharing voter data across multiple states.
The Fleming bill would need a final House vote by Friday to clear both chambers.
Esteves said a new system of multiple bilateral agreements to replace ERIC would be much more expensive and inefficient than the status quo.
Republican lawmakers argue the state should withdraw from a third-party system that could lead to voter privacy concerns.
Some Democratic members of the House have voiced opposition to a bill restricting counties from accepting hand-delivered absentee ballots on the weekend before an election, arguing that this could prevent college students and military personnel from voting.
Duluth Democratic Sen. Nabilah Islam Parkes slammed the bill for not securing elections but instead sabotaging them by “sewing distress, empowering conspiracy theorists, and silencing the voices of everyday Georgians.”
“Why are we tossing out a system that works and replacing it with political theater? she said. “HB 397 makes it harder, again, for folks to vote by mail.”
There are also several provisions in the bill aimed at expanding the power of the State Election Board, which has been under fire for its rulemaking in the run-up to the general election in 2024.
The bill would place the election board under the administration of the state accounting office instead of the secretary of state’s office.
State election officials would also have access to all state investigative reports and communications between the secretary of state and the local election superintendents. The bill would also spell out State Election Board rulemaking powers with proposed year-round authority to adopt election rules so long as they don’t take effect within 60 days of an election, according to the legislation.
Cumming Republican Sen. Dolezal rejected claims the legislation as the latest Republican voter suppression effort.
Dolezal said the increased minority voter participation since the passage of the Senate Bill 202 election law overhaul in 2021 demonstrates the law does not discourage minority voting.
“This bill in front of us here deals with processes by which we review who has moved out of the state,” Dolezal said. “We go through the tabulation process and when the election board is going to post information.
“Bringing up this debunked notion that was floated first by Stacey Abrams and then floated by Joe Biden and used to weaponize Major League Baseball to leave the state for a state who has very similar voting laws that we have, was ridiculous then is ridiculous today,” Dolezal said
Last week, Republican legislators advanced lHB 397 out of the Senate Ethics Committee, after making some last-minute changes were made that its sponsors said should alleviate some concerns heard during public meetings.
The current version of the bill no longer includes new mandates for requiring local election officials to hand count ballots as voting precincts are closing down for Election Day. It no longer includes a provision that would have allowed the State Election Board to hear appeals to a controversial mass voter challenge after complaints are settled by county election boards.
Paper ballots expansion spurs debate
Sylvania Republican Sen. Max Burns defended his Senate Bill 214 hand marked ballot measure as being significantly less costly than the projected $66 million needed to upgrade the current electronic voting system.
Burns said the legislation gives Georgians casting ballots during early voting and election days the option of paper ballots or the electronic touchscreen system that’s been used for statewide elections since 2020.
Burns said Wednesday that the cost of acquiring new scanners and implementing the new system is estimated to be less than half that of enhancing the current system.
Under the new legislation, the state would be required to use new voting equipment that features optical scanning systems for scanning and tabulating hand-marked paper ballots.
The new process would allow voters to request ballots similar to absentee ballots when they visit a polling place during early voting or on an Election. Day.
“The ballot itself is marked by the individual voter,” Burns said. “The voter uses a hand marking device, often called the pen, that marks the ballot that they can read. There is no QR code. They take that hand-marked paper ballot and they submit it to a scanner, a tabulator that senses the mark on the ballot.”
Sen. Sally Harrell, an Atlanta Democrat, cautioned against expressed hesitation in rushing through a significant change in the state’s election system at this late stage in the legislative process, which could result in further financial mismanagement. Friday is the last day of the 2025 Georgia General Assembly.
Harrell wondered aloud why Republican senators rejected her amendment proposing hand-marked paper ballots when lawmakers voted in 2019 to switch to an electronic voting system.
The state has spent more than $107 million on the Dominion Voting Systems that’s been used in statewide elections since 2020.
Harrell requested more information regarding the costs associated with implementing Burns’ new ballot plan while the state is still under a 20-year contract to pay off the Dominion machines until 2040.
Currently, President Donald Trump’s administration is advocating a major overhaul of elections, including guidance advising states against using barcodes or QR codes to tabulate votes.
“I have some of the same concerns (Esteves) raised about things coming from the federal government about what we can and can’t do over and over again,” Harrell said. “We are deciding to spend money on certain types of machines that we aren’t going to use long enough to justify the expenses. We made that mistake in 2019 and we’re making that same mistake now.”
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a “Make America Wealthy Again” trade announcement event in the Rose Garden at the White House on April 2, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (White House livestream image)
WASHINGTON (States Newsroom) — President Donald Trump rolled out sweeping “reciprocal” tariffs Wednesday on trading partners and allies across the globe.
Declaring that foreign trade practices have created a “national emergency,” the president unveiled a baseline 10% levy on all international imports, plus what he described as additional “kind” and “discounted” tariff rates that will increase but not match the rates other countries apply to American imports.
The levies will hit U.S. industries from agriculture to manufacturing to fashion.
The 10% universal tariffs become effective April 5, with higher levies set for April 9, according to Trump’s executive order. Trump’s remarks Wednesday about the start dates varied from the order’s language.
Trump is the first president to enact tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act — something he already did in March when slapping levies on China, Canada and Mexico over the production and smuggling of illicit fentanyl.
According to a table distributed at Trump’s speech, U.S. tariffs will reach 34% on imports from China, 46% on products from Vietnam and 20% on European Union imports, among other increases.
Canada and Mexico will not see additional tariffs on top of the already imposed 25% on goods (10% on energy and potash) not compliant with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, or USMCA. All compliant goods can continue to enter the U.S. levy-free.
The new 34% duties on China are set to stack on top of older 20% tariffs, according to some media reports, though Trump did not specify in his remarks or order.
Countries that levy a 10% tax on American goods — including Brazil and the United Kingdom — will only see a 10% match.
Business owners who purchase goods from outside the U.S. will have to pay the increased duty rates to bring the products over the border, unless Trump carves out exceptions for certain industries.
The president did not mention carve-outs in his remarks, but language in his subsequent executive order details exceptions for steel, aluminum, cars and auto parts already subject to tariffs under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act. Any products designated in the future under Section 232 will also be exempt from the new levies announced Wednesday.
Other goods not subject to the “reciprocal” tariffs include copper, pharmaceuticals, semiconductors, lumber, and “energy and other certain minerals that are not available in the United States,” according to the order.
Trump introduced the taxes on imports with fanfare Wednesday in the White House Rose Garden, where he said, “This is Liberation Day.”
“April 2, 2025, will forever be remembered as the day American industry was reborn,” Trump said.
“For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike,” Trump said.
Tariff table the Trump administration passed out to attendees at the April 2, 2025, announcement in the White House Rose Garden. (White House/X)
Republican lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana and Georgia U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, attended the event alongside several of Trump’s Cabinet members and representatives from the United Auto Workers.
Not all Republicans have signaled support for tariffs. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said at an event in his home state of South Dakota in August 2024 that Trump’s trade policy is a “recipe for increased inflation.”
The White House has circulated figures claiming the U.S. will raise up to $600 billion in revenue per year as a result of the tariffs. The figure was met with skepticism by economists because the amount of imports will likely change under higher levies.
The U.S. is the largest importer of goods in the world, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. The country’s top suppliers in 2022 included China, Mexico, Canada, Japan and Germany.
Economists: Americans will pay
Since Trump began campaigning on tariffs, economists have warned that increased costs for businesses will be passed onto consumers.
Rising prices under Trump’s “reciprocal” tariff scenario are likely to cost an extra $2,400 to $3,400 per family, according to the Yale Budget Lab, with most of the financial burden falling on the lowest-income households.
An analysis from the Peterson Institute on International Economics estimated the typical American household would lose over $1,200, just from the 25% tariffs already imposed on China, Canada and Mexico.
Several small business owners told States Newsroom Tuesday they’re worried about increasing production costs and whether higher prices will chase away customer demand.
Erica York, of the center-right Tax Foundation that advocates for lower taxes, said in an interview with States Newsroom Tuesday that the levies will be “the largest peacetime tax increase we’ve seen in history.”
State officials worry over impact
Democratic state officials sounded the alarm Wednesday over losses for key industries that drive their local economies.
New Mexico State Treasurer Laura Montoya said her state’s energy and agriculture sectors would be victims in a trade war.
“New Mexico is a key player in this conversation, because the non-negotiable reality is that New Mexico is, like the United States as a whole, dependent on trade with our international partners particularly Mexico,” Montoya said on a virtual press briefing hosted by the state economic advocacy group Americans for Responsible Growth.
Montoya said oil and gas production accounts for 35% of the state’s budget and that the industry relies on machinery imported from Mexico.
Additionally, New Mexico, a largely rural state, relies heavily on agricultural trade. It processes a third of the cattle coming across the southwest border, and Montoya said farmers and ranchers will “face blows as tariffs on cattle and produce will result in slow food production.”
Washington state, a top U.S. agricultural exporter, sources 90% of its fertilizer from Canada.
Treasurer Mike Pellicciotti said the state would be “completely squeezed” by “reckless economic decisions.”
“He is crushing the free exchange of goods, and making it much more difficult and much more burdensome on working families. So of course, he needs to call it ‘Liberation Day,’ because he knows he’s doing the complete opposite, and he is trying to frame it in a way that is completely the opposite of what is being accomplished today,” Pellicciotti said.
Dems predict consumer stress
Democrats on Capitol Hill seized on Trump’s new trade policy as a way to push their message that the president is abandoning middle and working class households.
Sen. Angela Alsobrooks of Maryland said the White House is “tone-deaf” in dubbing the tariff announcement as “Liberation Day.”
Trump has said in media interviews, “‘You know, there’s going to be a little pain, some minor pain and disruption.’ But the people that I represent don’t regard increasing costs of groceries, increasing costs of owning a home, increasing costs of owning an automobile, as a minor disruption,” Alsobrooks said.
In back-to-back Democratic press conferences Wednesday, Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia slammed Trump’s use of emergency powers in March to justify a 10% duty on Canadian energy and 25% on all other imports.
Kaine warned about the effect on his state’s sizable shipbuilding industry. Approximately 35% of steel and aluminum used to build U.S. ships and submarines comes from Canada, he said.
Senators approved, 51-48, a joint resolution Wednesday evening on a bill, sponsored by Kaine, that would undo Trump’s tariffs on Canadian imports triggered by an emergency declaration targeting illicit fentanyl coming over the northern border.
Four Republicans joined the Democrats in passing the largely symbolic legislation, which will now head to the House. The GOP senators included: Susan Collins of Maine, Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul of Kentucky, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
Earlier Wednesday, Kaine pointed to a report in Canadian news outlet The Globe and Mail that found the White House grossly overstated the amount of fentanyl smuggled through the northern border.
“Canada stood with us on 9/11, Canada has stood side-by-side with U.S. troops in every war we have been in. They have fought with our troops. They’ve bled with our troops. They’ve died with our troops in every war since the war of 1812, and yet we’re going to treat them like an enemy,” Kaine said.
Kaine’s bill, co-signed by eight Democratic and independent senators, drew one Republican co-sponsor, Paul of Kentucky.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries criticized Trump’s anticipated tariff announcement Wednesday morning at his weekly press conference.
“We were told that grocery costs were going to go down on day one of the Trump presidency. Costs aren’t going down in America. They’re going up, and the Trump tariffs are going to make things more costly,” Jeffries, of New York, said.
Republican lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana and Georgia U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, attended the event alongside several of Trump’s Cabinet members and representatives from the United Auto Workers.
The White House has circulated figures claiming the U.S. will raise up to $600 billion in revenue per year as a result of the tariffs — an estimate met with skepticism by economists.
