by Ty Tagami | Jan 23, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Voters in northwest Georgia will be going to the polls on March 10 to fill a newly vacated state Senate seat on the same day that they will decide whether the former occupant of that seat should rise to Congress.
The Georgia secretary of state’s office on Friday announced the special election date to replace former state Sen. Colton Moore, R-Trenton, scheduling the election for the same day as the special election for the vacant U.S. House district 14 that was held by Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Rome.
Greene resigned in early January with a year left in her term. Moore is among the 22 candidates vying to succeed her. He resigned in mid-January when he qualified as a candidate for the U.S. House election.
Moore held Senate district 53, which represents Catoosa, Chattooga, Dade, Walker, and a portion of Floyd Counties. Candidate qualifying for that seat begins 9 a.m. on Jan. 29 and ends 1 p.m. on Feb. 2, at the secretary of state’s office in Atlanta. Feb. 9 is the last day for voters to register, with advance in-person absentee voting beginning Feb. 16. A runoff election, if needed, will be on April 7.
by Mark Niesse | Jan 22, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — A Georgia Senate panel approved a resolution Thursday calling on Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to turn over the state’s unredacted voter list to the U.S. Department of Justice — including voters’ Social Security and driver’s license numbers.
The Senate Ethics Committee voted along party lines, with Republicans in support and Democrats opposed, to advance the resolution to a vote by the full Senate.
The resolution doesn’t carry the force of law, but it’s a symbolic effort to support the Trump administration’s nationwide effort to collect voters’ data — and to take aim at Raffensperger, a fellow Republican who is running for governor against Lt. Gov. Burt Jones and Attorney General Chris Carr.
Democrats objected to Senate Resolution 563, saying it could result in identity theft if the federal government shares voters’ private information with outside organizations in an effort to find noncitizens or double-voters.
“I’m deeply concerned that we are going to spend taxpayer dollars, a lot of them, millions of dollars, if we were to send this data information over and then also compromise the privacy data of our Georgia citizens,” said state Sen. Kim Jackson, D-Stone Mountain.
Republicans on the committee criticized Raffensperger for failing to show up at the hearing and for only providing a public version of Georgia’s voter list to the DOJ.
Senate Majority Whip Randy Robertson, R-Cataula, said Raffensperger is the one wasting taxpayer money by fighting with the federal government.
The DOJ recently sued Georgia for the full voter list, and a hearing is scheduled in federal court later this month.
“While we like to talk about this information being the most hyper-sensitive information in the world, it’s really not, which is why most credit card companies and others use different information now to prevent ID theft,” Robertson said.
Raffensperger’s office has said in court documents that state law prevents disclosure of voters’ Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, full birth dates and email addresses.
Besides Georgia, the DOJ has sued several Democrat-led states that have refused to comply with the request for voter records. Republican-run states such as Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee have agreed to provide full voter registration lists.
by Ty Tagami | Jan 22, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Gov. Brian Kemp announced a state of emergency for all Georgia counties Thursday ahead of a winter storm expected to dump snow and sleet onto the northern third of the state starting Saturday, potentially encasing the land in a layer of ice.
In an online briefing from Belgium Thursday, where he was traveling to promote trade, Kemp outlined state preparations for a wintry mix that could slicken roads and pull down power lines, darkening homes for days if temperatures remain as cold as predicted.
The governor said he had called up 500 National Guardsmen for deployment, if necessary. State agriculture and forestry crews are prepared with chainsaws to clear the way for power crews.
His main message: hunker down for the weekend.
“If you can just stay off the roads, that would be a big favor to us,” he said, noting that state police, utility crews and salt trucks need open roads to do their work.
The latter will begin brining roadways late Friday night or early Saturday morning. The governor placed the danger zone north of Interstate 20.
The National Weather Service has a winter storm watch in place in an east-west line just north of the Atlanta suburbs, dipping south as it moves to the east side of Georgia to take in Athens. The forecast calls for “heavy” mixed precipitation of up to two inches of snow and sleet, with ice accumulations of a quarter to three quarters of an inch.
Major potential impacts include travel disruptions and power outages as ice weighs down power lines and tree limbs that can break and fall on them.
Kemp said a drop in expected temperature of just a degree or two could push the danger line southward.
Josh Lamb, director of the state emergency management agency, advised filling cars with gas and emergency supplies, including snacks and blankets, and to drive cautiously on bridges and overpasses, which tend to ice up faster. But he also encouraged people to stay off the roads.
Lamb said Georgians should prepare their homes by covering pipes, cleaning gutters and stocking a three-day supply of food and water.
Prepare a way to keep cellphones charged while devising a communications backup plan for family members, he said. “Take precautions, don’t panic, and please stay informed and stay off the roads.”
by Mark Niesse | Jan 21, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Georgia legislators and the state’s elections chief lacked a plan Wednesday to stop using computer QR codes for counting ballots before a July 1 deadline.
Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger told a budget committee that the General Assembly hasn’t provided any money to upgrade Georgia’s voting system, which displays candidates on touchscreens and then prints paper ballots with QR codes containing voters’ choices.
But a state law passed two years ago mandates that QR codes can’t be used to count ballots in elections after July 1, 2026.
Critics of Georgia’s election system say voters can’t verify their votes from unreadable QR codes, which are used for the official vote count.
Lawmakers haven’t yet introduced a bill that would spend money or outline an alternative to the state’s current election technology.
Sen. Blake Tillery, R-Vidalia, suggested that every vote could be counted by hand this November — usually over 4 million ballots in midterm elections.
“If we were able to count all of them, would you not just be able to certify the hand count there and that suffice to meet the Senate bill’s request of not counting the QR code?” Tillery asked Raffensperger.
Raffensperger responded that each ballot can include 16 or 20 races, making it expensive and time-consuming to count each of them by hand. He said he would look into the taxpayer cost of that kind of hand count.
Gov. Brian Kemp’s proposed budget includes $5 million for a statewide hand recount of two races in November, but his spending plan didn’t include money to remove QR codes.
“The General Assembly has not funded a single dollar to upgrade the system. If you do fund that system, we could talk about alternatives,” Raffensperger said.
Raffensperger supported verifying ballots by using text-recognition software to check the results read from QR codes, a method first used after the 2024 election. The text-recognition audit found a nearly identical match to the election night count that relied on QR codes.
Kemp’s budget proposal also includes $1.8 million for a similar kind of vote check after the general election in November.
Hand-counts usually have more discrepancies than machine counts because they rely on humans, but they are another method of verifying results without depending on technology that could be manipulated or misprogrammed.
State representatives studied options for removing QR codes during meetings across the state last year, but they haven’t issued any recommendations. They’re still evaluating how to move forward, said House Governmental Affairs Chair Victor Anderson, R-Cornelia.
“The study committee and the House Governmental Affairs Committee are diligently evaluating legislative options to ensure compliance with the Legislature’s will and to guarantee that Georgia has the most accurate, trustworthy and secure elections possible,” Anderson said.
Lawmakers have until the end of this year’s legislative session in early April to pass a bill to stop using QR codes. Without a new law, voters can’t use Georgia’s current touchscreen voting system for elections later this year.
Several election security organizations are asking legislators to switch to paper ballots filled out by hand. But Raffensperger and election officials say Georgia’s current voting system is safe and accurate.
by Ty Tagami | Jan 21, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Former state Rep. Karen Bennett, D-Stone Mountain, pleaded guilty in federal court to making false statements to fraudulently obtain $13,940 in federal emergency relief funds during the COVID-19 pandemic, federal prosecutors said Wednesday.
“Bennett was elected to represent her fellow citizens and took a solemn oath to promote the best interests and prosperity of the State of Georgia,” Theodore S. Hertzberg, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, said in a statement. “Instead, she violated that oath and, during an unprecedented emergency, lied to line her own pockets with taxpayer money intended to help community members in need.”
Bennett submitted weekly certifications for benefits from March through August 2020, claiming she earned only $300 per week from the General Assembly and none from her employer, Metro Therapy Providers, Inc., asserting the company would not let her return to the office.
But prosecutors said she was sole owner of Metro Therapy, doing administrative work from home even before the pandemic and that the business continued to function and generate revenue for her when she was claiming the unemployment funds.
Bennett also concealed a $905 weekly paycheck from her employment at a church, Hertzberg’s office said.
Bennett, 70, resigned from her state House seat at the end of last year, several days before she was charged. Georgia election officials on Wednesday announced a March 10 special election to select a successor.
In another case, state Rep. Sharon Henderson, D-Covington, pleaded not guilty Dec. 8 to theft of government funds, also in connection with COVID-19 relief funding. She was also released on a $10,000 bond and remains in office as Gov. Brian Kemp convenes a panel to assess her fitness to serve.
