A.M. ATL: Board stiff

Morning, y’all! What do schoolchildren and migrating birds have in common? They both start their familiar patterns in August. It may still feel like summer, but shorter days have already cued some Georgia birds’ natural instincts to fly south for the winter. What admirable punctuality they have.

Let’s get to it.

GROUPS SUE OVER ICE DETENTIONS

A view from the Folkston ICE Processing Center in Charlton County. (Hyosub Shin/AJC)

A coalition of Georgia nonprofits is suing President Donald Trump’s administration for access to records about the growing footprint of immigration detention in the state.

• ICE detentions have soared in Georgia over the last 20 months.
• As of July 9, Georgia held 4,556 immigrant detainees, fourth-most out of all U.S. states.
• That’s a 90% increase compared with January 2025, when Trump took office for the second time.
• The ACLU of Georgia and others are suing ICE for more access to records to learn more about activities within Georgia’s detention network.
• They say this information shouldn’t be so hard to obtain, and yet remains “elusive.”

“This is the federal government,” Raneem Ashrawi, staff attorney at the ACLU of Georgia, said. “These are our government officials who are taking these actions using our taxpayer dollars to detain immigrants in Atlanta, in other parts of Georgia, and we have the right to know what they are doing.”

🔎 READ MORE: Georgia has been the site of several controversial ICE developments

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GEORGIA’S ELECTION BOARD IS AT IT AGAIN AHEAD OF THE MIDTERMS

Georgia State Election Board members Sara Tindall Ghazal (left) and Salleigh Grubbs during a monthly meeting. (Hyosub Shin/AJC)

In recent years, Georgia’s State Election Board has been plagued by infighting, feuds, insults, partisan maneuvering and out-and-out shouting matches.

Now that a critical round of midterm elections are on the horizon, some of the board’s members are still trying to push through measures other board members, state leaders, and the Georgia Supreme Court all say are outside of the group’s power to create.

• A trio of conservative election skeptics have majority control over the five-person board.
• They have proposed reviewing voter rolls for suspected ineligible voters and approving voting system security upgrades, and want to revive efforts that would move toward hand-marked ballots for the midterms — measures that sound benign, but critics say are steeped in partisan agendas.
• The major fear among critics is that they’ll use the Trump Administration’s revived interest in the 2020 election as a pretext for taking over Fulton County’s election operations for the midterms.
• However, they have vanishingly few legal avenues and no irrefutable evidence to do so.

More State Election Board facts:

The board used to be staffed exclusively with members who were lawyers. That’s changed over time. Now the board consists of two lawyers, a Waffle House executive, a conservative commentator and the former head of the Cobb County Republican Party.

Who gets to choose? Currently, these five individuals and groups each get to elect one member of the board:

• Governor
• State House
• State Senate
• Georgia Republican Party
• Georgia Democratic Party

🔎 READ MORE: A recent history of State Election Board controversies

MUST-KNOW POLITICS AND BUSINESS

⚡ Georgia Democrats are looking to get a key third seat on the five-person Georgia Public Service Commission in the midterm elections. The PSC has never had a Democratic majority, and Dem leaders say it would help keep Georgia Power accountable in an age of increasing strains on customers.

⚖️ Coca-Cola and Chick-fil-A are named in separate class action lawsuits related to separate data breaches that exposed sensitive customer and employee information.

ANNOUNCING THIS YEAR’S SUPER 11

The 2026 AJC Super 11 will be announced this week, with the first three members of the class being revealed Tuesday night. (AJC Varsity)

For 42 years, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has named the annual Super 11, a class of Georgia’s top high school football seniors destined to become the next generation of football stars.

This is a huge honor for Georgia’s graduating stars, and an important way to support our state’s legacy as a football powerhouse.

This year’s Super 11 class will be revealed over four days, starting tonight.

Keep up with the action

• The first three selections will be announced on AJC.com, coinciding with a live TV broadcast in partnership with Score Atlanta.
• The show begins at 8 p.m. and will air on Atlanta News First and Peachtree Sports Network.

We’ll check back in with the honorees later this week. Congratulations in advance, gentlemen!

🏈 READ MORE: More info on the announcements

NEWS BITES

Mauricio Pochettino will remain USMNT coach through 2030 World Cup

America’s Soccer Dad is sticking around!

Kids and screen time: Why balance is better than limits

Because we all know how much kids love limits.

Georgia is a digital payment hub. Is anyone still using checks?

Maybe parting with a lot of money should always be this formal and inconvenient.

Atlanta’s Roaring Social has a new martini dripping with real diamonds — for $10K

When I say, “Let’s get drinks,” this is what I mean. Aw, you’re buying? That’s so sweet! Don’t forget your checkbook.