Union-represented airport, hotel and retail workers protest outside the Atlanta office of U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler on Aug. 11, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
Dozens of airport, restaurant and hotel workers protested outside the Atlanta office of U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler, R-Ga., Tuesday over stalled talks in Congress on a new federal aid package amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Talks over a second round of federal coronavirus aid hit a roadblock last week as Democratic lawmakers in the U.S. House and Republican lawmakers in the U.S. Senate failed to strike an agreement over how much funding to send state and local governments and whether to reup the $600 weekly unemployment benefit.
That prompted President Donald Trump to issue executive orders on Saturday calling on states to issue eligible recipients $400 weekly unemployment checks starting this month, of which $100 would have to be covered by state funds.
The president also ordered federal housing officials to identify funding for homeowner and rental assistance, and for U.S. Treasury officials to defer payments on certain payroll taxes through the end of the year.
Loeffler, who is running a tight race to hold her Senate seat in the Nov. 3 general election, praised the president’s actions last Friday as talks in Congress fell short. She has supported passing new federal coronavirus aid funds that focus on boosting financial support for jobs, schools and health-care facilities, on top of divvying out unspent dollars from an earlier round of assistance passed in March.
Loeffler also brought legislation in June that would set the federal unemployment benefit at an amount equal to what workers were making while previously employed.
“Here in Georgia, we have thousands of jobs to be filled,” Loeffler said in a Fox News interview last Friday. “And sadly, millions have lost their jobs, but we need to make sure that we aren’t providing incentives for people to stay home.”
Union-represented workers in Atlanta protesting the lack of action on Congress’ part disputed that characterization Tuesday, arguing jobs in many industries like hotels and retail are still scarce and that the $600 weekly benefit has been essential to keep laid-off workers afloat.
Felicia Fashina, 55, said she has tried returning to her job at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport but that her employer has not brought back nearly as many workers as before the pandemic, forcing “skeleton crews” of shorthanded staff to juggle multiple tasks.
Now, her school loans and medical costs she covers for her elderly mother are piling up, even as she remains unable to afford a $500 monthly COBRA insurance payment offered by her employer to out-of-work staff.
“No one’s asking to get rich,” Fashina said. “We just want to survive, that’s all.”
Rodney Watts, 54, has also been unable to pay for COBRA insurance after being sent home from his 10-year job as an airport overnight supervisor in March amid the pandemic. While it would help, he is skeptical the reduced $400 weekly benefit will actually take effect.
“Is it going to go through?” Watts said. “There’s a lot of red tape behind it.”
Many critics of Trump’s executive order have questioned whether states like Georgia will be able to cover the 25% costs of the $400 weekly benefit, noting state governments are already facing huge budget cuts spurred by the economic slowdown.
New weekly unemployment claims in Georgia slowed earlier this month as initial claims filed in total since March 21 reached nearly 3.4 million, more than the state Department of Labor has handled during the last eight years combined.
The ongoing response to COVID-19 looks to be a major issue in the race for Loeffler’s Senate seat, to which she was appointed late last year following the decision by former U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., to retire due to health concerns.
Her main Republican opponent in the free-for-all special election, U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, R-Gainesville, has supported lowering the virus-prompted federal unemployment benefit or doing away with it entirely. The leading Democratic candidate in the race, Rev. Raphael Warnock, has called for the $600 weekly amount to remain in place.
Loeffler has also focused much of her campaign on policing issues and touting support for law enforcement agencies amid nationwide protests since June against police brutality and racial injustice.
In recent weeks, Loeffler has brought a legislative package in the Senate aimed at increasing penalties for criminal gang members, property destruction during protests and local governments that do not prosecute violent protesters and rioters.
Nearly two dozen candidates including Loeffler have qualified for the Nov. 3 special election to fill the remaining two years of the Senate term formerly held by Isakson. Candidates from all parties will be on the same ballot, and a runoff will be held in January if no candidate wins more than 50% of votes in November.
This story has been updated to include information on legislation Sen. Loeffler filed in June regarding unemployment benefits.
Voters wait in line at a precinct in Cobb County on May 18, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
Absentee ballots can be opened a week earlier than usual ahead of elections in Georgia following emergency steps the State Election Board took Monday to help ease a vote-tally bottleneck amid the COVID-19 pandemic and the upcoming Nov. 3 general election.
The board also gave Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger’s office the green light to create an online portal for voters to request absentee ballots via the internet rather than by mail or with a county elections office.
The rule changes come as state and local election officials hustle to improve the voting process in Georgia during the pandemic, which drove voters to cast ballots by mail in historic volumes and spurred hours-long lines at polling places during the primary elections in June.
Instead of two weeks before an election, local ballot-counting officials will be able to start tallying mail-in votes three weeks prior, according to an emergency rule change the state board approved Monday.
The online portal, which the state will run as a centralized system rather than counties running their own portals, is currently in a testing phase and should be ready to roll out before the fall election, Raffensperger’s office said.
To get a ballot, a voter’s name, birth date and state driver’s license or ID card number submitted via the online portal will have to match exactly with that same info as logged in the state voter registration system. A signature match would not be needed.
Combined, the two measures approved at a state board meeting Monday aim to curb problems seen during the June 9 primary in several counties including Fulton County, where local officials struggled to process mail-in ballot requests and handle long lines spurred by distancing due to the virus.
Some counties like Fulton were overwhelmed by the huge number of absentee ballot requests that poured in ahead of the primary, causing delays in the turnaround time for voters to receive ballots. Many Atlanta-area voters never received a mail-in ballot at all due to the processing logjam.
Shortly after, Raffensperger’s office announced it would not send out absentee ballot request forms to all of Georgia’s roughly 7 million registered voters, as was done for the primary. Several counties have elected to send out request forms on their own.
More than 1 million Georgia voters cast absentee ballots during the primary, marking a quantum leap in the number of votes submitted by mail rather than in-person at the polls. State and local officials are anticipating even more mail-in votes for the November election with a presidential contest and two U.S. Senate seats on the Georgia ballot.
Voters wait in line outside a polling place in Atlanta during the primary election on June 9, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
The Democratic Party of Georgia filed a lawsuit Thursday to force Georgia election officials to take steps to cut down long lines at voting precincts ahead of the Nov. 3 general election.
The lawsuit comes after several Georgia counties saw long lines at polling places during the primary elections in June and distancing measures mandated to curb health risks from coronavirus continue posing challenges for voter access.
Filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, the lawsuit seeks a court order requiring more polling places, better equipment training, extra time to set up precincts, backup voting machines and clearer instructions on when to switch to emergency paper ballots.
The lawsuit lays blame on county and state election officials for the long lines, arguing poll closures and consolidations, equipment issues, lack of training for poll workers and little emergency technical assistance have worsened lines on Election Day.
Hours-long waits in line to cast ballots have the potential to pose not just an inconvenience but a source of disenfranchisement for Georgia voters, making it a legal matter that should be addressed in court, the lawsuit argues.
“Defendants’ systemic failures in election administration have led to long lines that have resulted in significant disenfranchisement of Georgia voters for over a decade now as voters who are forced to wait in line leave and many others never enter the line at all, deterred by the impending wait,” the lawsuit says.
Several Georgia voters joined the lawsuit along with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.
The lawsuit especially singles out Fulton County, which saw huge lines during the primary election in early June, and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, whose office has placed blame squarely on Fulton and a handful of other county election officials for local precinct problems.
Those problems are poised to be potentially worse for the Nov. 3 general election, when millions of voters are expected to head to polls during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the lawsuit argues. Long lines would pose health risks for elderly Georgians and those with chronic illnesses.
Responding to the lawsuit, Raffensperger’s office noted many duties like adding polling places and voting equipment fall to counties to implement but that the state had provided local officials with data to help make improvements to reduce long lines for the November election.
“We will work around the clock from here through the elections – under the extraordinary circumstances of a pandemic – to ensure that all eligible Georgia voters are informed fully about any polling place changes, that we have enough precincts and poll workers and that we do everything possible to minimize lines,” Deputy Secretary of State Jordan Fuchs said in a prepared statement.
Raffensperger’s office also criticized Democratic state lawmakers for opposing a bill brought in the 2020 legislative session that was originally aimed at reducing the size of any precincts that have long waits.
Democratic lawmakers in the state Senate voted against the initial version of the bill, arguing it was rushed through the session with little scrutiny and could end up curbing voter turnout in areas where precincts had been split.
However, that language was stripped from the bill in June and amended by the Republican-controlled Georgia House Governmental Affairs Committee to prohibit state and county officials from sending out unsolicited absentee ballots, a move Democrats saw as a bid to stifle mail-in voting amid the pandemic.
The bill never came to the House floor for a vote after passing out of committee.
This story has been updated to include additional background on the precinct legislation filed in the 2020 session.
U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler speaks at the State Capitol after qualifying for the 2020 election on March 2, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler, R-Ga., has doubled down on criticism of the Women’s National Basketball Association after players from several teams – including one which she co-owns – wore shirts to games Tuesday night urging voters to support her Democratic opponent, Rev. Raphael Warnock.
The shirts, which read “Vote Warnock,” served as a rebuke of Loeffler over comments she has made in recent weeks denouncing the league for its outspoken backing of the Black Lives Matter movement, amid months of nationwide protests against police brutality and racial injustice.
Loeffler, an Atlanta businesswoman who co-owns a team in the league, the Atlanta Dream, took heat for opposing plans for players to wear pre-game shirts supporting the protest movement and to have “Black Lives Matter” painted on the Florida basketball court where all games are being played this year.
Following the posting of photos of players wearing the “Vote Warnock” shirts on social media Tuesday, Loeffler issued a statement reiterating her stance against the Black Lives Matter organization “due to its radical ideas and Marxist foundations,” as well as calls to reduce local police funding.
“This is just more proof that the out-of-control cancel culture wants to shut out anyone who disagrees with them,” Loeffler said. “It’s clear that the league is more concerned with playing politics than basketball.”
Warnock, who is the senior pastor at Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, praised the players for wearing the shirts and slammed Loeffler’s comments as moves that “seek to silence and dismiss others when they speak up for justice.”
“We are in a moment of generational, transformative change, and there is no place in the movement for bigotry,” Warnock said. “We celebrate the courage and resolve of these players standing for justice, and I am proud to stand with them.”
Loeffler, who was appointed in December to hold the seat of retired U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., has drawn a field of 20 other contenders in the free-for-all race to win her seat.
They include her toughest Republican opponent, U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, R-Gainesville, who has taken aim at Loeffler for not condemning the league’s support for Planned Parenthood.
The Nov. 3 special election for Loeffler’s Senate seat will see candidates from all parties on the ballot. A runoff will be held in January if no candidate wins more than 50% of votes in November.
Congressman Doug Collins speaks outside the Georgia House of Representatives on Jan. 28, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
A federal ethics complaint was filed Tuesday against Republican U.S. Senate candidate Doug Collins alleging the Gainesville congressman’s campaign has used videos of U.S. House floor broadcasts for political ends in violation of congressional rules.
Filed by the Democratic Party of Georgia, the complaint highlights YouTube videos and a recent ad attacking Collins’ chief opponent, U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler, R-Ga., that show the congressman speaking from the House floor during last year’s presidential impeachment proceedings.
House rules forbid floor footage from being used as material for partisan political campaigns due to the risk that elected leaders may treat Congress as a venue for showmanship rather than to work in the public’s best interests, the complaint notes.
“This is the exact kind of conduct the ethics rules are designed to prevent,” reads the complaint, signed by Georgia Democratic Party Executive Director Scott Hogan.
A spokesman for Collins dismissed the complaint, labeling it an attempt by Loeffler and state Democrats to censor him. His campaign also noted the videos in question contained footage used in television news segments, not from C-SPAN.
“They really, really don’t want Georgians to see the video of Doug demolishing the Left as Trump’s chief defender during impeachment,” said spokesman Dan McLagan.
Several of Collins’ ads on Facebook were the subject of a previous ethics complaint filed by state Rep. David Clark, R-Buford, on grounds that they contained House floor footage.
Georgia Democrats also jabbed at Loeffler, an Atlanta businesswoman, in a news release Tuesday by drawing attention to controversial stock transactions she made ahead of the country’s COVID-19 outbreak that prompted a federal investigation.
Most recently, Collins’ campaign lashed out at a new ad released by Loeffler-supporting a political action committee with ties to Gov. Brian Kemp, who appointed Loeffler in December to hold the seat of retired U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson on an interim basis.
On Monday, Loeffler’s campaign criticized Collins for accepting donations from large tech companies amid congressional antitrust scrutiny into firms like Google, Facebook and Amazon.
Collins is set for a roughly weeklong tour at Warner Robbins Air Force Base, where he serves as a reserve chaplain.
The race for Loeffler’s seat has drawn 21 candidates in a free-for-all contest involving candidates from all parties on the same ballot. A runoff will be held in January if no candidate wins more than 50% of the vote on Nov. 3.
U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler speaks at the State Capitol after qualifying for the 2020 election on March 2, 2020. (Photo by Beau Evans)
U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler’s campaign has brought on a former field director for Gov. Brian Kemp to run her on-the-ground voter outreach operations ahead of the Nov. 3 special election.
Chris Allen, who ran then-gubernatorial candidate Kemp’s outreach in 2018, has been tapped as Loeffler’s state field director in charge of voter mobilization efforts, her campaign announced Monday.
Allen also managed state Rep. Kevin Tanner’s campaign for the 9th Congressional District seat that he lost in the Republican primary in June.
Loeffler, R-Ga., is looking to fend off challengers from all sides as she campaigns to keep her Senate seat, to which she was appointed by Kemp in December to replace retiring U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga.
The race has drawn 20 candidates seeking to unseat Loeffler, an Atlanta businesswoman and wife of Jeff Sprecher, CEO of Intercontinental Exchange Inc., which owns the New York Stock Exchange.
U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, R-Gainesville, whom Kemp passed over for the Senate appointment in favor of Loeffler, is aiming to shore up conservative grassroots support ahead of the election. His campaign has polled neck-and-neck with Loeffler’s in recent polls.
On the Democratic side, Rev. Raphael Warnock is pushing to distinguish himself on issues from his Republican counterparts as he collects a stream of endorsements from prominent Democratic groups and leaders.
Warnock, the senior pastor at Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church, is facing fellow Democrat Matt Lieberman, the son of former U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, who polled higher than Warnock in a Monmouth University poll released last week.
The Nov. 3 special election is a free-for-all contest involving candidates from all parties on the same ballot. A runoff will be held in January if no candidate gains more than 50% of votes.
