Tuesday, April 9, 2024
Good morning! We start today with demands by Coastal Georgia officials for a high-ranking official to step down from the state GOP’s executive committee. We then look at a Coastal Georgian’s successful effort to stymie the legalization of sports betting. Finally, we round up some political news affecting our region. Questions, comments, or story ideas? You can reach me at craig.thecurrent@gmail.com.
NEWS
Distraction
Coastal Georgia Republican officials are urging a member of the state party’s executive committee, a prominent 2020 election denier, to step down from his post.
Late last month, a state administrative judge ruled that conservative talk show host Brian Pritchard had broken state election laws by voting nine times while serving probation for a felony check forgery sentence.
In a posting on Facebook last week, Kandiss Taylor, chair of the 1st District Republican Committee, lambasted Pritchard for failing to relinquish his seat as first vice chair of the state GOP. She said the man who described himself as a “champion of election integrity” was a distraction from the state GOP’s main priority: getting Donald Trump elected in November.
Taylor’s calls for Pritchard to step down have been joined by the heads of Republican committees in Chatham and Bryan counties and by a Glynn-based, former first vice chair of the state executive committee.
But Pritchard, who told a gathering of Chatham County Republicans last spring that “2020 was rigged” and has accused Gov. Brian Kemp and Attorney General Chris Carr of being “complicit” in what he has insisted was a stolen election, isn’t going quietly, The Current’s Craig Nelson reports.
NEWS
In the middle
Whether the recently completed session of the Georgia General Assembly was a tale of accomplishment (if you’re Republican) or a tragicomedy (if you’re a Democrat), the recently completed session of the Georgia General Assembly left a lot on the cutting room floor.
Case in point: legislation legalizing sports betting in Georgia.
Neither a proposed state constitutional amendment or authorizing legislation for sports betting ever came to a vote in the House, after a committee passed it the last day of the session.
For some lawmakers, failure to get a bill to the floor for a vote would be failure. For Jeanne Seaver, a resident of south Savannah and head of Moms Against Gambling, that was a victory, The Current’s Craig Nelson reports.
NEWS NOTES
9 things for your radar
- Running out of time: At Blessing of the Fleet festivities in Darien on Sunday, grand marshal — and shrimper — Darrell Gale told The Current’s Justin Taylor that time’s running out on Georgia’s shrimping industry unless state and federal lawmakers take action to defend it from imported shrimp. “If we don’t get subsidies quickly, this [the industry] is all gone,” Gale said.
- Stop the bulldozers: Today is the last day to submit a written comment on draft permits greenlighting mining near the Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge. More than 70,000 comments have already been submitted to the state’s Environmental Protection Division, Georgia Recorder’s Jill Nolin reports.
- Be nice, folks: The Walthourville City Council will take up a resolution pledging to “practice and promote civility” between the city’s mayor and council members, The Current’s Liberty County reporter Robin Kemp reports. The council meeting starts at 6 p.m. at the Walthourville Police Station.
- Not happy: “We are deeply disappointed in President Trump’s position,” said Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, after the presumptive Republican nominee in this year’s presidential race said abortion should be left to the states in the post-Roe era, declining to endorse any national limit on the procedure.
- Fighting child abuse: 1st District U.S. Rep. Earl “Buddy” Carter goes on Fox and Friends with Paris Hilton to discuss a bill aimed at combatting institutional child abuse.
- Line up: Donald Trump travels to Atlanta tomorrow to attend a fundraiser hosted, by among others, former U.S. senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus, poultry tycoon Tommy Bagwell, beverage magnate Don Leebern III, and Buckhead cityhood proponent Bill White. A photo op with the former president will cost a cool $25,000 per couple
- ‘Delivering the Truth’: The Chatham County Republican Party last night hosted Michael Flynn and a screening of his movie, “Flynn: Deliver the Truth. Whatever the Cost” on its premiere U.S. tour. Flynn, a leader of the “Stop the Steal” effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, has been systematically building a political movement based on Christian nationalist ideas, The Associated Press reported in 2022.
- Politics and scrambled eggs: The Chatham County Republican Party is hosting a meet-the-candidates breakfast at the Savannah Country Club on April 27. For information and tickets, click here.
- Coming our way: U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff we’ll be in Coastal Georgia on April 23, attending a fundraiser sponsored by Skidaway Island Democrats then heading to Bryan County to headline a dinner hosted by the county’s Democratic Party committee. Patti Hewitt, 1st District Democratic candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives, and William Boddie, Esq., Former Georgia House Representative District 62, are also slated to attend.
ICYMI
- “1 in 3 rural Black Georgia men feel suicidal, study finds” (Axios, April 2, 2024) “One-third of rural Georgia’s young Black men reported suicidal ideation in the past two weeks, research shows. Childhood trauma and racism may be responsible.”
- “Trump says going to jail for gag order violation would be a ‘great honor,’ compares himself to Mandela” (CNBC, April 6, 2024) “I will gladly become a Modern Day Nelson Mandela — It will be my GREAT HONOR,” the former president wrote in a lengthy Truth Social post attacking New York State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan, who is presiding over Trump’s case.”
- “Turner: Russian propaganda ‘being uttered on the House floor’” (Axios, April 7, 2024) “House Intelligence Committee Chair Mike Turner (R-Ohio) said Sunday that it’s ‘absolutely true’ that Russian propaganda has made its way into Congress.”
- “Opinion: Let’s say it plainly: Fact-checking is not censorship” (Poynter Institute, April 2, 2024) “Fact-checking adds to the public debate; it doesn’t suppress it.”
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Sports betting fails again in Georgia
Jeanne Seaver of Savannah credits a team effort to stop gambling push in state legislature.
Coastal Georgia GOP officials call for state committee member to resign
A state administrative judge ruled that conservative talk show host Brian Pritchard had broken state election laws by voting nine times while serving probation for a felony check forgery sentence.
Hinesville adds more special conditions to mobile home park deal
Owner’s representative didn’t attend meeting, and city made deal contingent on company keeping its word to move tenants at no cost.
Georgia braces for another round of election law changes
Critics say ballot challenges won’t clean up rolls, will hurt eligible voters.
Southwest Georgia hospital could reopen with help from federal appropriations
A feasibility study underway will help decide the new model for the facility. Randolph County lost its only hospital in 2020 after decades of it being in operation.
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