As metro Atlanta's Snowjam melts into the region's consciousness, Gov. Nathan Deal's political opponents hope the government's troubled response to the weather bogs down his march to re-election.

The governor’s backers say the icy gridlock that stalled metro Atlanta will fade from voters’ minds by the sunny May 20 primaries and be a faint memory by November’s elections. But his opponents are painting it as the latest in a series of tone-deaf moves from Georgia’s top leader.

Deal has responded with a vigorous public schedule and plans a series of announcements in the coming weeks on new state emergency procedures designed to show the governor is embracing needed changes.

“Sometimes people remember things like that, sometimes they don’t,” Deal said of the weather debacle. “It happened. It’s an event of history now, but it’s recent history.”

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Former Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan speaks on the third day of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago on Wednesday, Aug. 21, 2024. He is running for Georgia governor as a Democrat. (Arvin Temkar/AJC )

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Fulton DA Fani Willis (center) with Nathan J. Wade (right), the special prosecutor she hired to manage the Trump case and had a romantic relationship with, at a news conference announcing charges against President-elect Donald Trump and others in Atlanta, Aug. 14, 2023. Georgia’s Supreme Court on Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025, upheld an appeals court's decision to disqualify Willis from the election interference case against Trump and his allies. (Kenny Holston/New York Times)

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