Legislators from across the state are headed home after 40 days under the Gold Dome.
The end of the legislative session came well after midnight after a flurry of measures passed. They included a budget that would boost pay for teachers and state employees, election changes and immigration measures that would require local law enforcement to comply with Immigration Customs Enforcement.
A rift between the two chambers grew as the Georgia Senate served up several red-meat bills that the state House ended up blocking. “In the end, the House blocked pretty much every really controversial measure,” Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter Greg Bluestein says. “We’re talking MAGA license plates, a Clarence Thomas statue at the state judicial building, a ‘religious liberty’ revival (and) measures that would control how public school teachers can talk about gender and sex in classrooms.”
But as WABE’s Sam Gringlas points out, many of these measures aimed at pleasing the Republican base were introduced during an election year. “So I think this election dynamic is one thing that makes this session different from, say, an off-year,” he says.
Another measure that didn’t make the cut was a bill to further protect the Okefenokee Swamp.
Senate Bill 132 would have placed a three-year freeze on new applications for certain mining.
AJC Publisher Andrew Morse says the swamp is worth protecting.
”We have something in the state of Georgia that can be as special as the Grand Canyon or the Everglades,” he says.
The stakes were even higher for bills to pass because the General Assembly operates on a two-year session, which ended last night.
So the bills that failed Thursday will have to be reintroduced at the start of the next session.
The measures that did make it through the session now sit on Gov. Brian Kemp’s desk. He has 40 days to sign them into law or veto them.
Monday on ”Politically Georgia”: Professors Andra Gillespie and Amy Steigerwalt and immigration lawyer Chuck Kuck join the show.
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