Primary Prep, Questions Voter Registrations

Sunday Solutions — May 17, 2026

Good morning! Your final chance to vote in the May primaries is Tuesday. Need to do some homework? We have resources for you.

Want to catch up on how business and home owners are faring after the Brantley County fires? We have that, too. And we have a look at Gov. Brian Kemp’s final bill signings and vetoes plus a real-life story of what happens when health insurance costs explode. Let’s roll.

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NEWS: ELECTIONS

Early votes set a record

Congrats to the 1,025,400 of you who voted early! Way to go! In Coastal Georgia, McIntosh County leads the way with 19.9% of voters having cast a ballot. Camden County lags with 10.4%, just behind Chatham at 10.9%. Glynn hit 13.6%; Bryan, 13.9%; and Liberty ended the week at 14.1%. You can read a state roundup here.

If you didn’t get a chance to vote or you still need to do some homework or it’s your first primary in Georgia, here’s what you need to know as you head for the polls on Tuesday:

• In the open primary, voters can choose which party ballot they’d like at the polls. If you don’t choose a party ballot, you can vote on the nonpartisan races — and there’s a host of those important ones, including most school boards seats and judges.

• Georgia’s open primary and non-partisan races are on the ballot, along with some party questions on various issues, depending on which ballot you request. None of those questions are binding and are designed by the parties for messaging or stance purposes later.

•To get a look at your sample ballot to start your homework, go to https://mvp.sos.ga.gov/s/ to check your voter status, your precinct location and view your sample ballot. You can print copies from that site, if you choose. Then, you can start your research.

• Check out our Voter Resource Guide. We have handy links to stories, candidate forum videos, candidate profiles and some other helpful sites where you can look up things like voting records and campaign financing info. We’ve added a few stories this week about candidates and the state races this week. You can find a link to those there, too. Your best way to hold public officials accountable is through your informed vote.

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Unlimited campaign money

One of the many forces behind the tsunami of Georgia campaign ads are the state “leadership committees” established under a controversial 2021 state law that says top state leaders can raise and spend unlimited money for elections.

Gov. Brian Kemp, for example, is term-limited and can’t run again.  But he’s collecting millions through his Georgia First Leadership committee and spending it on campaign strategies and favored candidates. Georgia Power was its biggest single donor in 2025 and 2026, giving $1 million in total. See all reports from all leadership committees via the Georgia Ethics Commission’s contribution data page and under “Filer Type,” choose “Leadership Committee” and “all years.”

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NEWS: COMMUNITY

Long road to federal aid, wildfire recovery

While the rest of us are monitoring the primary outcomes this week, Brantley County residents are watching their elected representatives for different results: getting aid to help recover from the devastating wildfires that burned more than 200 homes and businesses. Former U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who now leads the U.S. Small Business Administration, visited the area on Friday to meet residents and business owners who lost nearly everything in the fires. Standing with the owner of a destroyed wedding chapel, Loeffler described the winding path to federal aid to people who are sleeping in cars and wearing borrowed clothes. Read the story from The Current‘s Margaret Coker.

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NEWS: VOTING

When your voting residency is challenged

A few weeks ago, reader Diane Petzold brought The Current a letter she’d received. It said her address had been flagged as “potentially vacant” and it asked her to contact the Chatham County elections office to verify her residency to be able to vote. Petzold has lived at her address for more than a decade, she’s a regular voter and a longtime poll worker. Her husband didn’t receive the same letter. Both were suspicious. The Current‘s Maggie Lee chased the story and followed the processes the Georgia Secretary of State’s office uses to flag voters, the role of the U.S. Postal Service, and how it works when counties receive the notices. You can read the explanation here and find out whether Petzold can vote on Tuesday.

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NEWS: GOVERNING

Signatures, vetoes and redistricting

Gov. Brian Kemp was busy this week. The last gasp of the 2026 Georgia Assembly came Tuesday as Kemp signed, vetoed or made exceptions to bills and budgets. He signed an income tax cut, slashed money out of the state budget to cover it and then vetoed a few other items that he felt weren’t properly funded or too loosely defined. You can read the official lists here. After that, he called a special legislative session after the June runoff election date for lawmakers to fix the QR code ballot mess and, while he was at it, he asked them to consider redistricting for representative voting districts for 2028 elections. After sparking that controversy, he took a minute to suspend the state gas tax again for a bit “due to the risk of acute consumer shock due to volatile prices on everyday goods and services, including, but not limited to, gas prices.”

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NEWS: HEALTH CARE ACCESS

☕ Your second cup: When insurance costs spike

You’ve likely heard about or experienced the rising costs of health insurance, and you’ve probably heard how Affordable Care Act premiums spiked when federal subsidies weren’t renewed. Reporter Ariel Hart brings us a day in the life of a Savannah woman who now works three jobs in the gig economy — where no employer offers benefits — to afford the new ACA premiums. Her costs are 7 times higher than last year’s. The coverage, which she says is a literal lifeline, is all that’s available to her as she recovers from a devastating wreck.

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