by Ty Tagami | Jun 1, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Most of Georgia’s statewide primary races have been settled on either the Democratic or Republican ticket, but the race for leadership of the state Senate remains up for grabs on both sides of the aisle.
While not a senator, the lieutenant governor presides over the chamber and can control committee assignments and the flow of legislation. The lieutenant governor also fills in for the governor when necessary.
The partisans who survived last month’s primary election for the job will face each other in a June 16 runoff. On Sunday, they squared off in person in a studio at Georgia Public Broadcasting in Atlanta, for what will likely be their final debate.
It can be difficult to find daylight between candidates from the same party, so in the first debate the remaining two Republicans attacked each other’s leadership skills, pitching themselves as best able to execute on policy.
The Democrats followed a similar script in their subsequent debate.
Both Republicans, Sen. Greg Dolezal of Cumming and former Sen. John F. Kennedy of Macon, said they want to cut taxes further than the GOP-controlled Legislature did this year.
Dolezal said that could be done without reducing services.
“For far too long, the Republican Party has been the party of crony capitalism,” said Dolezal, blaming his own partisans for approving budget-eating tax giveaways. “And if we get rid of these crony capitalist tax cuts, we can reduce and ultimately eliminate the state income tax here in Georgia.”
Kennedy resigned in early December because Georgia bars lawmakers from raising campaign funds during the legislative session. So he did not have to shoulder responsibility for the Senate’s failure to abolish income taxes as planned or the House’s similar failure to eliminate property taxes.
Kennedy said he could reduce taxes further if he were lieutenant governor.
“The Legislature was not able to get relief to hard-working Georgians,” he said. “I come in with a good reputation of working with all people, working with folks across the aisle, excellent relationships with those in the House and the governor’s office. And that’s what it takes.”
Kennedy noted that he was elected Senate president pro tempore, the highest leadership office for a senator.
Dolezal never made it into one of the top six Senate leadership spots for Republicans after serving a similar amount of time.
Dolezal described himself as a loyalist to President Donald Trump, noting that he was among a handful of senators who called for a special legislative session to investigate Trump’s 2020 election loss to Joe Biden.
“If a close friend came to you and said, ‘I’m looking for a conservative fighter,'” Dolezal said. “Who would you recommend? The one who goes along to get along or the one who has a record of standing and fighting?”
He echoed fears voiced in Texas where some Republicans contend that parts of the state are at risk of falling under Islamic legal influence.
“I’m fighting to ban Sharia law,” Dolezal said.
The Democratic debate featured bitter exchanges between Sen. Josh McLaurin of Sandy Springs and Nabilah Parkes, a former state senator from Gwinnett County.
Parkes had initially planned to run for insurance commissioner, but she abruptly changed course in March to join the contest for lieutenant governor.
Like Kennedy, she resigned her seat in the Senate so she could raise money for her campaign.
Unlike Kennedy, she waited until the legislative session had already started, leaving her seat vacant from mid-March into the busiest period of lawmaking.
Kennedy was succeeded by a Republican in February after a special election. A special election to fill the remainder of Parkes’ term is set for June 16, the same day as the primary runoff in the race to succeed her next year.
McLaurin called Parkes a quitter, and she called him a feeble campaigner, an insult he returned. Parkes, who is Muslim, has pointed to Dolezal’s campaign ads about Islam as her reason for breaking ranks with Democratic leaders to run for lieutenant governor.
Parkes described herself as a fighter from a working-class family who attended public schools and qualified for the free and reduced-price meals there before she attended Georgia State University.
McLaurin attended a private K-12 school in Buckhead, then the University of Georgia and Yale Law School, though he said his parents came from hardscrabble backgrounds.
McLaurin described himself as a “skillful” operator, able to ridicule Republican lawmakers for supporting Trump while earning enough of their respect and trust to pass legislation. He cited a bill to regulate car booting and one another for therapies for veterans.
Parkes attacked McLaurin as a Democrat who “coddles” Republicans.
“We don’t need a candidate that goes along to get along, like my opponent,” she said.
McLaurin said the Senate would likely remain under GOP control after the November general election and that Republicans would almost certainly strip the lieutenant governor of power if a Democrat were to win the office.
He characterized Parkes as ineffective, noting that scores of Democratic lawmakers have endorsed him, as has Stacey Abrams, who twice won Georgia’s Democratic gubernatorial nomination. On Monday, Democratic U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock added his endorsement.
“I imagine that my bipartisan work probably does look like coddling Republicans to somebody who hasn’t done any of it,” McLaurin said. “So, the bottom line is this: I am a fierce fighter. I have stood up to MAGA Republicans. I’ve called them narcissist coddlers to their face, but I get stuff done, and that’s why I can win in November.”
Watch the debates online at https://www.gpb.org/election/press-club-debates.
by Ty Tagami | May 29, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Things were looking grim for Georgia’s wild pigs during this year’s legislative session, but they found partial salvation in lawmakers who larded their own budget with too much pork.
Gov. Brian Kemp, in his effort to balance the budget, cut hundreds of millions of dollars in new spending when he signed it earlier this month.
He highlighted some of the major cuts at that time but did not mention the pig eradication projects nestled deep within the 171-page document.
A $1 million public-private pilot program to manage feral hogs was a victim of his line-item veto, as was a $200,000 wild pig eradication program.
The latter sounded like a bounty program to Nick Atwood, an Atlanta volunteer with a loose-knit group called Rooting for Pigs.
Studies have shown bounty programs are ineffective at wildlife control, whether for prairie dogs, raccoons or feral hogs, Atwood said. His group sent Kemp a letter in mid-April explaining all this and suggesting that cutting the programs could save taxpayers some money.
Atwood does not know whether the message led to Kemp’s line-item vetoes, but he thinks it might have.
Asked about this, Kemp’s office did not want to engage in the specifics, referring instead to Kemp’s comments on May 12 when reporters gathered in his office to watch him sign the budget.
The governor said then that he had to fix a “structural deficit” that had left a roughly $1 billion hole in the budget. He said he could have left it alone but that he did not want to leave “a mess” for whoever succeeds him as governor next year, or for the next Legislature.
“So what we’re doing now is making some tough choices,” he said.
The eradication programs had been something of a priority for lawmakers, especially in the House.
Owing to limited time (and attention spans), Rep. Matt Hatchett, R-Dublin, could only detail a small number of items in the $38.5 billion fiscal year 2027 budget when he presented it on the House floor on March 10.
Hatchett, who chairs the House Appropriations Committee, talked about money for big issues, such as education, health care, prisons and poverty.
But he left time to talk about wild pigs, and the money in the budget to get rid of them.
“Feral hogs are wreaking havoc statewide,” he said, “causing millions of dollars of damage to crops and farms each year.”
The next week, the Senate sent House Bill 946 to Kemp, a measure that authorizes the use of drones to locate feral pigs while hunting them and allows their capture without a hunting or trapping license if they are killed on site.
The measure passed the Senate unanimously, after Sen. Lee Anderson, R-Grovetown, implored his fellow lawmakers to help farmers.
“I just ask each and every one of you vote green so we can go kill some hogs this afternoon,” he told them.
Kemp signed it earlier this month.
So wild hogs still have some worries.
Atwood said they do not deserve the treatment, describing them with words one might use for the teenagers next door (or in your home).
“Pigs are intelligent, curious, adaptable animals that are often misunderstood,” he said.
by Ty Tagami | May 28, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Georgia Power customers will see a slight reduction in power bills after the state agency that regulates the monopoly utility approved rate changes Thursday.
The Public Service Commission, an elected body with five members, had previously frozen the company’s electricity rates for three years. But that decision in early 2025 did not apply to rate adjustments to cover the changing cost of fuel and storm damage.
Rather than raising rates, the agreement Georgia Power made with the commission will cut typical residential customer bills by about $4 a month, or about $285 million collectively per year.
“After recent rate increases caused by inflation, the war in Ukraine and other global phenomenon, it’s great to be able to offer some relief to Georgia Power ratepayers,” Chairman Jason Shaw said in a written statement after the vote approving the changes.
Georgia Power is reducing the rates in part by using federal tax credits for nuclear power production.
Although the vote for approval was unanimous, two new Democrats on the panel voted unsuccessfully to amend the rate agreements, with the three Republicans opposed.
Commissioner Peter Hubbard, one of the Democrats, said his four amendments would have saved ratepayers another $50 million.
“Instead, the majority put the company first,” he said in a statement.
Hubbard said he voted for the unamended agreements to lock in “as much relief as possible” ahead of summer, with the revised rates taking effect in June.
During the hearing, critics said Georgia Power was still getting a deal because the company secured authority to purchase more coal than usual at above-market prices.
Under Georgia law, the company can pass along fuel prices to customers if they are “just and reasonable.”
Commission staff said during the hearing that Georgia Power had historically purchased about a tenth of its coal at above-market rates. The deal approved Thursday allowed it to purchase up to 15% at higher prices.
Environmentalists had wanted the limit set at 5% but acknowledged the commission staff had negotiated a better deal for ratepayers than Georgia Power had first offered.
The company’s initial rate proposal earlier this year would have saved customers only about $1.30 a month.
Georgia Power will make another fuel rate adjustment request in less than three years, in February 2029.
The storm damage portion of the costs being passed to consumers was mostly from Hurricane Helene. Georgia Power has said the historic hurricane caused $800 million in damage to about 12,000 power poles, 1,500 miles of power lines and more than 5,000 transformers.
The Republican-led commission has become a target for angry voters after allowing Georgia Power to make a half dozen rate increases in recent years. The commission also approved a 10 gigawatt expansion in December, largely to serve anticipated demand from data centers.
In a special election last year, Hubbard unseated Republican Fitz Johnson. Johnson is back on the ballot and will try to retake the seat from Hubbard in the November general election.
Likewise, Democrat Alicia Johnson unseated a Republican last year, winning a spot on the commission through 2030. Another seat is in play after Republican Tricia Pridemore opted not to run for reelection, creating the possibility of Democratic control next year.
by Ty Tagami | May 27, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — Voters recovering from the long list of candidates that greeted them on their primary election ballots last week will have to return to the polls soon for runoff elections.
The Atlanta Press Club will help voters make informed choices with a final round of livestreamed debates Sunday and Monday.
It is the latest installment in a two-decade tradition that “provides the most comprehensive, timely and widely viewed series of political debates during every election year in Georgia,” according to the press club, which has been hosting the forums with Georgia Public Broadcasting.
Their forums in late April featured crowded fields, with each candidate receiving minimal airtime. Now, with some primary races decided and others whittled to two candidates from each party, each office seeker who accepts an invitation to debate will get more time.
Sunday’s schedule features the remaining two Republicans vying for U.S. Senate and hoping to contest incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff in the November general election, along with the two Republican candidates for Public Service Commission District 5 to succeed Tricia Pridemore, a Republican who did not seek reelection.
Also on Sunday, the press club will host forums for the two surviving candidates from each party running for lieutenant governor and secretary of state.
Monday’s schedule features the governor’s race. Lt. Gov. Burt Jones and billionaire Rick Jackson were the top vote-getters in last week’s GOP gubernatorial primary.
The winner of their June 16 runoff will run against former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, a Democrat. She won her primary outright last week.
Also on Monday are two Republicans for state school superintendent, one of them incumbent Richard Woods, and the final two GOP candidates for the 11th Congressional District in north metro Atlanta, where incumbent Rep. Barry Loudermilk, a Republican, is retiring.
On the Democratic side Monday are debates for candidates seeking their party’s nominations for labor commissioner and insurance commissioner; the winners will face the Republican incumbents in November. Also on the schedule is a debate for the remaining two Democratic candidates for the 1st Congressional District, a coastal post held by Rep. Buddy Carter, a Republican who lost his bid for U.S. Senate last week.
The forum lineup also includes the Fulton County Commission chair race, in which Democratic incumbent Robb Pitts was invited to debate his remaining Democratic challenger, Mo Ivory.
No runoff was required for attorney general, agriculture commissioner, Public Service Commission District 3 or for the congressional races in the 10th, 13th and 14th districts.
Debate times and streaming information are available on the Atlanta Press Club website: https://atlantapressclub.org/debates/.
by Ty Tagami | May 26, 2026 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — The policies that Georgia uses to approve or deny services for children enrolled in Medicaid fail to satisfy federal requirements for adequate care, according to a new federal court ruling.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit upheld a federal district judge’s order requiring the Georgia Department of Community Health (DCH) to provide nearly five times more in-home nursing care to a child at risk of dying than the state had approved through a contractor.
The 3-year-old boy, referred to by the court as L.W., has a rare metabolic disease that interrupts his body’s ability to store and use glycogen, a kind of fuel.
He must be fed every three hours through a tube inserted into his stomach.
Before moving to Georgia from Virginia, Medicaid was paying for 56 hours of nursing care per week while paying the boy’s mother to provide another 40 hours.
After moving to Georgia in 2023, Alliant Health Solutions, a contractor that manages Medicaid for the state, approved only 21 hours of nursing services with no supplement for the mother, since Georgia lacks such a program.
“Over the months that L.W.’s parents and physician were asking Georgia to increase L.W.’s nursing hours, L.W.’s parents managed to keep L.W. alive,” the judges wrote in their May 18 opinion. “But their success came at a tremendous cost to L.W.’s parents and L.W.’s health.”
The boy’s fatigued mother often slept through the alarms she set to wake herself up so she could feed him in the middle of the night. Several times she awoke to find his glucose readings dangerously low. Once, when his parents could not maintain his glucose levels, L.W. had to be hospitalized for about a week.
In 2024, his mother requested a change in the number of nursing hours. When Alliant denied it, she sued in federal court in the Northern District of Georgia. Federal Judge Thomas W. Thrash Jr. decided 21 hours of weekly nursing care was inadequate and ordered the state to pay for at least 100 hours.
DCH appealed. The agency’s failure to win that appeal produced a ruling that could influence how Medicaid is administered in Georgia and in the rest of the Eleventh Circuit’s jurisdiction, which includes Alabama and Florida.
“This is telling DCH, ‘your responsibility is to ensure that care gets provided’,” said Roland Behm, co-founder of the Georgia Mental Health Policy Partnership.
“As long as it’s medically necessary and it can go to correct or ameliorate, then you have to say yes to that because that’s the obligation that you took on as the state Medicaid agency and that you contracted with these other entities to do,” he said.
Under the federal Early and Periodic Screening, Diagnostic and Treatment standard, states must cover medically necessary services for children that “correct or ameliorate” a physical or mental condition.
A spokeswoman for DCH said Tuesday that the agency was still reviewing the court decision and had no comment.
The agency’s lawyers had contended in court that the decision to limit L.W.’s nursing hours was legal because it followed agency policy. But the three-judge panel ruled that the policy had failed L.W. and his parents and that the state had an obligation to review the facts of each case to provide the minimum level of care required under the federal Medicaid Act.
One of the Eleventh Circuit judges wrote a concurring opinion that criticized DCH’s policy as “poorly drafted and hard to make sense of.” The policy was written with a “repetitive structure and odd phrasing,” Judge Britt C. Grant wrote.
Her critique also noted that DCH had not included the relevant policy in the court record and that she could not find it in the agency’s manual.
“Given these discrepancies,” she wrote, “I am unsure about what the Department’s real policy is. Nor do I have any idea what policy, if any, was applied to L.W.’s change request.”
