Morning, y’all! Stop sitting on those unpaid tolls. (We’ve all had them, this is a no-judgment zone.) Peach Pass officials will waive toll violation fines if you pay the missed toll by the end of June. Easy as pie.
Let’s get to it.
GA COULD BE THE SITE OF THE LARGEST U.S. IMMIGRATION JAIL
Credit: Hyosub Shin/AJC
Credit: Hyosub Shin/AJC
Local officials greenlit a plan to increase capacity at the Folkston ICE Processing Center in South Georgia. If it goes through, the detention center would be the largest Immigration and Customs Enforcement jail in the country.
- Folkston can currently hold as many as 1,100 detainees.
- That number would increase to nearly 3,000 under Charlton County’s new agreement with ICE.
- The plan incorporates a defunct federal prison near the property.
- The Stewart Detention center, also in South Georgia, is the country’s second busiest ICE detention center. An expansion at Folkston would make Georgia a nexus of the Trump administration’s growing deportation plans.
🔎 READ MORE: What local lawmakers have to say about the plan
Unrest in LA
Meanwhile, National Guard troops arrived in Los Angeles on Sunday after a dayslong clash between authorities and immigration protesters.
- More than 100 people were arrested by ICE after a series of raids in the area last week.
- Crowds gathered outside the Metropolitan Detention Center and tried to block ICE vehicles.
- The arrival of about 300 National Guard troops sparked even more fear and unrest. Some protesters heckled the armed troops, chanting “shame” and “go home.
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FRESH GREEN STEPS IN MACON AND SAPELO
Credit: Justin Taylor for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Credit: Justin Taylor for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Two Georgia towns are trying new solutions for difficult environmental problems. We love to see people working together for a good cause.
🦪 Shells on Sapelo Island
Sapelo Island is home to the last remaining Gullah Geechee island communities, making it a cultural and historical treasure along the Georgia’s coast. However, rising sea levels threaten the island and its delicate ecosystems.
Researchers from the University of Georgia are partnering with Sapelo residents to test nature-based solutions, like building up oyster reefs along the shoreline. These barrier reefs could protect the island from storm surges and erosion.
🎥 WATCH: A deep dive into Sapelo’s history, and why saving the sinking island is critical to Georgia culture
🥬 Advanced farming in Macon
Macon just celebrated the opening of the newest BrightFarms facility, an 8-acre indoor farm that uses cutting-edge sustainable technology. The farm will harvest approximately 6 million pounds of lettuce annually. High-tech indoor farms allow for more crops to be grown in smaller spaces, with more frequency and less wasted resources. The Macon location is now the largest BrightFarms facility in the Southeast.
GA GOP CONVENTION TAKEAWAYS
Credit: Jeff Amy/AP
Credit: Jeff Amy/AP
The Georgia Republican Convention took over Dalton this weekend, and one party line resonated above all: Go Trump or go home.
“It’s backing President Trump right now,” GOP strategist Steve Bannon told the crowd.
Eyes were also on the 2026 midterms as Georgia gears up to elect a new governor, and state Republicans still search for a Senate contender to challenge Sen. Jon Ossoff.
- U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene made comments that sounded an awful lot like an emerging political platform, from abolishing state income tax to reopening mental hospitals in the state. Now there are murmurs she may be mulling a run for governor.
- Former University of Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley, son of famed UGA football coach Vince Dooley, said he’s considering a 2026 run for U.S. Senate. The field is starting to get thick for Ossoff’s challenger.
MUST-KNOW POLITICS AND BUSINESS
⚖️ The Supreme Court enabled the Department of Government Efficiency with two key rulings. One gives DOGE access to Social Security systems containing personal data on millions of Americans. The other sweeps aside attempts to increase transparency around the agency.
📚 Trump officials have vowed to end school desegregation orders set in place during the Civil Rights era.
💰 A paradigm-shifting $2.8 billion settlement paved the way for the NCAA to start paying college players millions of dollars. Here’s how it could affect Georgia athletics.
NEWS BITES
Braves swept by Giants, losing streak hits 7
Mmm, some good old-fashioned Atlanta sports suffering.
Former Atlantan Coco Gauff used words and a mirror to persuade herself she could win the French Open
Manifestation at work, folks.
Here are the Tony Award winners from last night
Do you know the full name of the Tony is the Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre? They should make a play about her.
A quirky vegetable sculpture contest features a squash Donald Trump and a papal ‘Cornclave’
And God saw the cornclave, and, behold, it was very good.
ON THIS DATE
June 9, 1961
Credit: AJC
Credit: AJC
From the front page of The Atlanta Journal: We will cross the continent or the Atlantic in one hour and 15 minutes beginning in about 1970. In the various vehicles of 1970, we will fly at three times the speed of sound. We will fly straight up. We will ride on a cushion of air just off the ground. We may own compact cars with a new kind of battery, the fuel cell driving a tiny electric motor at each wheel. These are among the things that many scientists and transportation men predict will be developed in the next 10 years – until in the air-cars, sky-jeeps and sky-liners of 1970 men and women of all nations will make today’s world travelers look like stay-at-homes, and the new worldwide contacts and population shifts will deeply change world relations.
Old predictions for the future are such rich texts because they’re either somewhat depressing (“Everyone will have clean water and no world hunger!”) or, like these, absolutely unhinged. “We will fly straight up” is tantamount to a threat.
ONE MORE THING
Enjoy your morning commute in your sky-jeep!
Thanks for reading to the very bottom of A.M. ATL. Questions, comments, ideas? Contact us at AMATL@ajc.com.
Until next time.
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