by Ty Tagami | Jun 27, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — On Tuesday, Georgians will reap what their state lawmakers sowed when a slew of new laws take effect, from divisive limits on transgender student athletes to a broadly popular guarantee to keep in vitro fertilization legal.
In addition to keeping options to start life, the General Assembly gave Georgians a new way to say goodbye to loves ones when life ends.
They addressed technology that is changing how we live, letting Georgians use a digital replica of their driver’s license on their phone during traffic stops while at the same time banning cellphones in elementary and middle schools.
They also passed laws affecting the justice system, food safety and taxes.
Senate Bill 1 was the first item on the Republican-led state Senate’s agenda. It generally prohibits student athletes in private and public schools and colleges from competing in interscholastic and intercollegiate sports on teams that do not match their birth gender.
Lawmakers spent many hours debating whether transgender athletes were a threat to the safety of girls and women during competition, and whether there were enough of them to merit a legal ban.
Democrats called it unnecessary and dangerous. Republicans called it necessary for safety, asserting that female athletes could be injured when competing against transgender opponents.
“This common-sense legislation is about what is fair and safe for our children,” said Gov. Brian Kemp, when he signed the measure into law in April. “Girls should not have to share a playing field, a restroom, or locker room with boys.”
Georgia House Speaker Jon Burns, R-Newington, said the legislation would ensure “no young woman is ever forced to face a biological male on the field, on the court or in a locker room.” It wasn’t an ideological issue, but one of “right or wrong,” he said.
Critics fear the new law will encourage bullying of transgender youths. They also worry that girls with a masculine appearance will face unwanted scrutiny. The law allows parents to challenge their gender.
“It’s legalizing discrimination,” said Lynn Green, of Rome, whose transgender son, Ash, was born female.
Green said there are no documented incidents of transgender athletes playing on Georgia school teams, but Ash, 17, corrected her.
While not interested in playing sports himself, Ash has heard about a female high school athlete who is transitioning to male. Under this law, he must still compete on a girls’ team.
“That would be stupid,” Ash said, adding, “There are definitely trans athletes in Georgia. I just don’t think they’re as big of a deal as the bill is making them. They’re not going to affect anyone. They’re not beating people up.”
There were plenty of laws that were not so controversial.
For instance, House Bill 428 passed with just one “no” vote in the Senate and no opposition in the House, as Republicans and Democrats found a rare moment of solidarity in support of protecting in vitro fertilization. The legislation was prompted by an Alabama Supreme Court ruling last year that declared frozen embryos had to be treated as children. Since some embryos are destroyed during the procedure, it was ruled illegal, raising concerns about legality in Georgia. Now, by near unanimous consent, it is clearly legal.
Read on for highlights about new laws on other important topics.
TECHNOLOGY
- House Bill 340: no more cellphones in public schools, at least from kindergarten through middle school. The proponents of this ban on devices that are widely viewed as a distraction stopped short of prohibiting them in high schools. But ban backers said high schools could be next. In the meantime, the law gives elementary and middle schools until fall 2026 to figure out how to stop their students from using their phones at school.
- House Bill 296: think of this one like chocolate meets peanut butter; nearly everyone has a smartphone and nearly everyone has a driver’s license. So why not put them together? This law goes into effect Tuesday but gives police two years to prepare. Apps to carry and read a digital license already exist. For instance, flyers can present their license in Apple Wallet at select Transportation Security Administration checkpoints. But the digital licenses are otherwise limited until July 2027, when Georgia drivers will be able to present their phones to police if they don’t have a physical license handy. Officers will not be authorized to take the phone or rifle through it, but they will have to be equipped to scan the digital license.
JUSTICE
- Senate Bill 244: this law was backed by Republicans but drew support from some Democrats. It gives money to people whom a court determines were wrongfully convicted, awarding them $75,000 per year of imprisonment. It also reimburses defendants for attorney fees and court costs when a prosecutor is disqualified due to improper conduct and the case is then dismissed. Those indicted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis in connection with her criminal case against President Donald Trump stand to benefit.
- Senate Bill 79: far too many people, young people in particular, have died because they have taken fentanyl, sometimes unknowingly. The drug is used as a painkiller in medical settings, but it has found its way to the streets — often contaminating other drugs, such as Adderall, Oxycodone and Xanax. And it is 100 times more potent than morphine. This law imposes mandatory minimum sentences on those convicted of trafficking fentanyl.
- House Bills 85 and 86: these two measures update the way judges are paid, the former striving to equalize local supplementary pay for superior court judges and the latter indexing pay for state supreme court justices, appeals court judges and a statewide business judge to what federal judges make.
- House Bill 161: this law expands the authority of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation to secure subpoenas without asking a court. With the attorney general’s approval, the GBI will be able to compel telecommunications companies to turn over customer information, including name, address and connection records, such as service usage times and durations. The types of investigations that will warrant these extrajudicial subpoenas include crimes against children, crimes facilitated by a computer and, crucially when it came to securing lawmaker support, the crime known as swatting, which, according to testimony, is happening more frequently against politicians; swatting is when someone calls police to an address on false pretenses.
FOOD
- House Bill 398: home bakers and other makers, it’s time to go to market. This new “cottage food” law will allow home cooks to sell their goods online, by mail, in grocery stores and at restaurants. The food must be stable without temperature control, so refrigerated items are not included. But breads, cakes, cereals, jams, jellies, preserves, pasta, produce, dried fruits, herbs, nuts, seasonings, vinegar, dill pickles, dry soup mixes and roasted coffee beans generally are included.
- Senate Bill 144: any pesticide with a federally-approved label shall be deemed adequately labeled in Georgia and will satisfy the state law duty to label the substance.
DEATH and TAXES
- Senate Bill 241: this is another one that passed with big bipartisan majorities. It allows the composting of human corpses and inspired gallows humor at the Capitol that eased discomfort about the topic. The new law offers grieving families some measure of comfort, proponents noted: it will let them plant flowers in soil that came from a departed loved one.
- House Bills 111 and 112: the former is a tax cut and the latter is a taxpayer rebate. The cut will reduce the state income tax rate from 5.39% to 5.19% retroactive to the beginning of the current tax year. The rebate will give taxpayers a one-time bonus: $250 for single income tax filers, $375 for single filer heads of household and $500 for married couples filing jointly.
by Ty Tagami | Jun 26, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction Thursday against enforcement of a 2024 Georgia law that sought to limit social media companies’ access to children.
The Protecting Georgia’s Children on Social Media Act sailed through the General Assembly with broad bipartisan support and was a top priority for Republican Lt. Gov. Burt Jones.
But Amy Totenberg, a federal judge for the Northern District of Georgia, said the industry-backed plaintiff in the case was likely to prevail on claims that the law violates the First Amendment’s speech protections.
To restrict speech, the government must have a “compelling interest” that is “narrowly tailored,” the judge’s order says. But this law had “flawed tailoring,” she wrote, and it “curbs the speech rights of Georgia’s youth while imposing an immense, potentially intrusive burden on all Georgians who wish to engage in the most central computerized public forum of the twenty-first century.”
The plaintiff, a group called NetChoice, represents a who’s who of social media companies, Including Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta, YouTube, Reddit, X and Pinterest.
“Free expression doesn’t end where government anxiety begins,” said Chris Marchese, NetChoice’s litigation director. “Parents — not politicians — should guide their children’s lives online and offline — and no one should have to hand over a government ID to speak in digital spaces.”
NetChoice had urged Gov. Brian Kemp to veto the bill last year, asserting that it was unconstitutional.
But Kemp signed the legislation, which required social media companies to make “commercially reasonable efforts” to verify users’ age and mandated parent consent for those under 16. It also banned advertising to children.
Supporters had cited numerous studies that found social media posed significant danger to young people, particularly girls, increasing their risk of suicide.
Among Judge Totenberg’s criticisms was the age verification provision that she said imposes “severe burdens” on all Georgians.
The judge noted that NetChoice has challenged similar laws in at least eight other states, including Texas, Ohio, Arkansas, California, Utah, Florida, Mississippi, and Tennessee.
“Nearly all of those state laws are currently enjoined on a preliminary or permanent basis,” she added.
by Ty Tagami | Jun 26, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — The University System of Georgia has joined five other public systems in the South to establish a new accreditation model for their institutions and for higher education broadly.
The multi-state consortium announced Thursday that its new accreditation organization will prioritize academics, student outcomes and achievement.
“Our work with the Commission for Public Higher Education aims to keep Georgia’s universities among the best in the nation by focusing on high standards and real value for students and families,” University System of Georgia Chancellor Sonny Perdue said. “Collaborating with neighboring states lets us put resources where they make the biggest difference, and I look forward to the success of an effort that increases accountability and drives meaningful innovation.”
Institutions such as the University of Georgia are accredited by an independent organization called the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and its Commission on Colleges.
But that organization has increasingly come under scrutiny from conservatives, fending off allegations of a liberal bias as critical race theory and diversity, equity and inclusion policies became a target for Republicans, including Georgia lawmakers.
The multi-state consortium’s announcement provided few details about its new accreditation model, instead offering general statements about what the Commission for Public Higher Education (CPHE) will achieve.
“By establishing rigorous, transparent, and adaptable outcomes-based accreditation standards and practices, CPHE will ensure that colleges and universities meet and maintain academic quality and operational excellence on behalf of their students,” a statement from the Board of Regents said.
The consortium comprises the state university systems for Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.
The Texas A&M University System is also a member. The incoming chancellor there, Glenn Hegar, promised a “less cumbersome” and “more objective” accreditation process.
“In recent legislative sessions, our top state officials have sought a more reasonable and transparent pathway toward accreditation,” he said.
University of North Carolina System President Peter Hans said CPHE will lower costs and “build confidence” in public higher education.
Chancellor Ray Rodrigues of the State University System of Florida said the new operation will ensure the use of student data for decision-making while improving efficiency and effectiveness.
by Ty Tagami | Jun 25, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — When younger students return to Georgia public schools this fall, they will learn an old-school skill: handwriting.
New changes to the state standards for English Language Arts will require the teaching of cursive writing in elementary school. The state Board of Education approved the standards overhaul two years ago but gave teachers until this fall to prepare.
Georgia is joining other states, from Alabama to Texas, that are resurrecting a skill that had seemingly gone the way of the dodo after the proliferation of laptops and touchscreen devices. Even California, the cradle of computer keyboards, passed a law requiring cursive in schools in 2023.
Compulsory cursive writing has been tucked into dozens of pages that describe the standards for English in elementary school.
The state board approved the revised standards in a 13-1 vote in May 2023.
In third grade, students will have to learn how to read phrases and sentences in cursive, and they will practice forming letters and word connectors. By fifth grade, they will be called on to write whole texts in cursive, “legibly and efficiently,” with appropriate spacing throughout. All along, they will be working on fine motor skills that some feared had gone extinct.
At a state school board meeting last month, Richard Woods, the elected state school superintendent, introduced a new initiative to promote those loopy letters: the John Hancock Award will go to schools that demonstrate excellence in cursive.
“Cursive writing is more than just a skill — it strengthens fine motor development, improves literacy, and connects students to historical documents in their original form,” the award description says.
Woods got big applause when he mentioned the new requirements at the Republican state convention in Dalton in early June.
People clapped when he announced that students would have to learn about personal finances. But the audience erupted when he said cursive writing was back.
“Every student will own their signature. Every student will know how to read our original documents in their original script,” Woods said, adding that children should be able to read the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Independence and other texts handwritten by the nation’s founders.
by Ty Tagami | Jun 24, 2025 | Capitol Beat News Service
ATLANTA — When Kaycee Maruscsak’s baby died before birth, she had to carry the infant’s corpse in her womb for more than a week because, she said, doctors refused to remove it for fear of violating Georgia’s abortion restrictions.
“I should not have had to wait eight days to have a dead baby removed out of me,” she said at the state Capitol Tuesday.
The story of the 31-year-old Lilburn woman was part of the bitter testimony during a state Senate Urban Affairs Committee hearing that Democrats hope will galvanize Georgia voters against Republicans, who backed the state’s new limits on abortion. They scheduled the hearing on the third anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision striking down the decades-old legal precedent that had guaranteed women’s right to abortion.
No Republican officials appeared for the hearing, including Attorney General Chris Carr. He had declined the Democrats’ invitation to talk about Georgia’s abortion law, which bans the procedure once a fetal heartbeat is detected, typically around six weeks from conception.
The Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization allowed Georgia’s 2019 abortion restrictions to take full effect last year, after a delay caused by a lawsuit.
Pregnant women have subsequently been denied medical care in Georgia during miscarriages because of uncertainty among doctors about whether they could face prosecution for it.
In one highly publicized case, Amber Nicole Thurman died after doctors delayed removing remnants of her fetus after she self-aborted the baby by taking pills.
Her mother, Shanette Williams, asserted her death was caused by doctors.
“She didn’t just die. She was murdered by the people who took the oath to do no harm,” said Williams, who testified at Tuesday’s hearing via Zoom. She said her daughter died of sepsis, which she said could have been avoided with a 3-minute procedure that she said was withheld for 20 hours.
She described taking her grandson, now 8, to scatter Skittles over his mother’s grave — one of her favorite snacks — on a rainy Mother’s Day.
Democratic senators and others who testified blamed a “vague” Georgia abortion ban that they said creates an “air of criminality” around women who miscarry or need an abortion for a medical reason. They skewered Carr, who is running for governor, saying he could reduce the number of these incidents by issuing an opinion clarifying when abortion is legal under the law.
Senate Minority Leader Harold Jones II, D-Augusta, called Carr’s absence “shameful.”
At a press conference after the hearing, the Democratic senators drove home their point with a poster showing Carr’s smiling portrait on a milk carton, under the word “missing.”
Carr’s office told Capitol Beat that he informed the committee weeks ago that he had longstanding commitments and could not attend the hearing.
“It’s disappointing to see a serious topic overshadowed by partisan theatrics,” Carr’s office said.
Maruscsak, who had to carry her daughter, Sawyer, in her womb for a week after the baby’s heartbeat stopped, described her struggles to find medical care.
She said she visited multiple doctors and abortion clinics and even waited seven hours in an emergency room overflow bed, while bleeding, and couldn’t get the fetus removed despite symptoms of sepsis.
Maruscsak said she had placenta previa, whereby the placenta attaches to the wrong part of the uterus. She said she had to leave the emergency room to find a doctor who was bold enough to remove the fetus despite the abortion ban, eventually trying as many as five doctors.
She predicted that other Georgia women will have the same life-threatening experience.
“This issue will touch every family in some way, someday,” she said.
