Georgia Public Broadcasting says Trump’s cuts would pose ‘serious challenge’

Today’s newsletter highlights:

• Chatham County elected officials hold closed meeting.
• Congress considers annual fee for electric vehicle drivers.
• Georgia has a connection to this week’s papal conclave.

Broadcasting threat

President Donald Trump has long set his sights on cutting funding for public broadcasting, and late last week he pulled the trigger with an executive order aimed at stripping subsidies for both PBS and NPR — a move that puts the future of Georgia Public Broadcasting in doubt.

GPB President and CEO Bert Wesley Huffman summed up the stakes in a plea to supporters on Friday titled “Help Protect the Future of GPB.”

“While much of our funding comes from donors like you, foundations and local businesses, the loss of our federal grant of $4.4M presents a serious challenge,” he wrote.

The heads of NPR and PBS have both said Trump’s order is illegal, comments suggesting a likely legal challenge. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting also sued Trump last week after he tried to fire three of its five board members.

GPB airs statewide via a network of local TV and radio stations, including public broadcasting mainstays like “Sesame Street,” “Antiques Roadshow” and “All Things Considered.”

Bert Wesley Huffman is CEO of Georgia Public Broadcasting.

Huffman urged people to contact their congressional representatives to “have your voice heard.” But many Georgians aren’t likely to find a receptive ear among the state’s Republican dominated congressional delegation.

U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Rome, has led the charge to defund PBS and NPR, hosting a hearing in March designed to expose what she and other MAGA republicans view as political bias among public media.

“NPR and PBS have increasingly become radical, left-wing echo chambers for a narrow audience of mostly wealthy, white, urban liberals and progressives who generally look down on and judge rural America,” Greene said.

For what it’s worth, Georgia’s Republican-dominated state Legislature appears to still support public broadcasting in Georgia. The most recent state budget, approved by lawmakers last month, includes $13.2 million for the Georgia Public Telecommunications Commission plus an additional $865,000 to pay for generators and replace an FM transmission facility in Pelham.

But GPB hasn’t been immune to past cuts. State lawmakers slashed the system’s budget in 2023 by roughly 9%, a cut engineered by Senate Republicans who said they heard from other radio operators wondering why the state was funding the outlet.

Things to know

Charlie Bailey was elected chair of the Democratic Party of Georgia on Saturday.

Good morning! Gov. Brian Kemp has nine days left to either sign or veto bills passed by the state Legislature this year. He’s signed 62 bills into law so far and hasn’t vetoed anything yet. You can follow along with the AJC’s Legislative Navigator.

Here are three things to know for today:

• About 10 years ago, Hollywood railed against a “religious liberty” bill that was ultimately vetoed by Republican Gov. Nathan Deal. This year, Gov. Brian Kemp signed another version into law with barely a peep from entertainment companies. The AJC’s Savannah Sicurella writes about what changed.
• Democratic state Sen. Josh McLaurin is running for lieutenant governor, the AJC’s Maya T. Prabhu reports. He’s the first candidate from either party to enter the race.
• Georgia Democrats elected Charlie Bailey as the party’s next chair, the AJC’s Michelle Baruchman and Greg Bluestein report. Bailey, a former two-time candidate for statewide office, won with 53% of the vote over former Rome City Commissioner Wendy Davis.

Blistering goodbye

At the end of the month, Gary Rower is stepping down as chair of the Fayette County Board of Elections and Voter Registration. But before he does, he had a scathing warning to his colleagues that the Constitution is “under attack” by those who seek to undermine election integrity.

From his farewell dispatch:

Shut out

Chester Ellis (right), chair of the Chatham County Board of Commissioners, poses for a photo with Savannah Mayor Van Johnson during St. Patrick's Day festivities in March.

A gathering of Chatham County’s elected officials seemed to send a curious message to taxpayers: give us $625 million, and shut up about it.

The county’s local governments are asking taxpayers to extend a 1% sales tax in November. But when they met to talk about it Friday, they made sure to bar the public from participating, according to the AJC’s Savannah Bureau Chief Adam Van Brimmer.

Chatham County Board of Commissioners Chair Chester Ellis instructed the county’s eight cities to send no more than two elected officials to the meeting, allowing them to skirt Georgia’s open records law that requires government meetings to be open if three or more members are present.

Elected officials turned away reporters from The Current, an online publication that covers Georgia’s coast, and the Savannah Morning News. The journalists were trying to understand which projects elected officials wanted — and why.

“It’s a room full of elected mayors, county commissioners and city and county managers there to talk about the needs across Chatham County and how they’d spend taxpayer money. So it was a chance for the county chair to allow the public to show all of that works,” said Susan Catron, managing editor of The Current and one of the journalists turned away Friday. “But instead Chairman Ellis threw out the very people who could help explain the process to larger number of constituents.”

If this all sounds familiar, it’s because Ellis has done this before. He convened an unannounced meeting in 2022 about another sales tax item. Several attendees found it so distressing they leaked the time, date and place of the next meeting.

Electricity guzzling

A resident charges an electric vehicle at a station in Decatur.

As more people buy electric cars, policymakers are grappling with how to make sure these drivers of the future pay their fair share to maintain roads and bridges. Georgia drivers could end up paying more than most.

The government maintains roads through a tax on gasoline, which EV drivers don’t pay. Last week, House Republicans advanced a proposal that would charge EV owners a $200 annual fee. U.S. Rep. Mike Collins, R-Jackson, voted for it while U.S. Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Lithonia, voted against it.

Johnson said he supports the idea of EV owners paying “their fair share into the highway trust fund,” but said he voted against the bill because it was part of a larger reconciliation package “that will give huge tax cuts to Elon Musk and his billionaire buddies” and would cut spending for Medicaid, Medicare “and other vital programs.”

Critics note that $200 is more than the driver of a gas-powered vehicle pays in fuel taxes for one year. But a big reason for that is Congress has not raised the federal gas tax — currently at 18.4 cents per gallon — since 1993. Meanwhile, the federal highway trust fund has a projected deficit of $270 billion over the next decade, according to the Tax Foundation.

In Georgia, EV drivers already pay a state fee of $219.50. Georgia is one of 10 states that ties that fee to inflation.

In 2023, lawmakers agreed to add a sales tax to the electricity at EV charging stations. The tax was supposed to take effect this year, but lawmakers delayed it until 2026.

Conclave

Cardinal Wilton Gregory is archbishop emeritus of the Archdiocese of Washington.

We follow elections of all kinds here at Politically Georgia, and that includes one of the most anticipated (and rare) elections in the world.

Catholic cardinals will meet this week to begin the process of electing a new Pope. Among the electors is Wilton D. Gregory, the former Archbishop of Atlanta and the first Black cardinal from the United States.

Picking a pope is super secretive. Cardinals deliberate inside the Sistine Chapel and are cut off from all contact with the outside world. Only those cardinals younger than 80 can participate. At 77, Gregory just makes the cut.

We won’t know how Gregory or any other cardinal votes. But his tenure in Atlanta and, later as archbishop of Washington, offers some clues.

In 2018, he invited a Jesuit priest to speak about how the church can be more welcoming to LGBTQ+ communities, a move that angered some conservatives. And in 2020, Gregory sharply criticized the Saint John Paul II National Shrine after the National Guard used tear gas to move protesters so President Donald Trump could visit.

“I find it baffling and reprehensible that any Catholic facility would allow itself to be so egregiously misused and manipulated in a fashion that violates our religious principles, which call us to defend the rights of all people even those with whom we might disagree,” Gregory said at the time.

Gregory retired earlier this year. He is now archbishop emeritus of the Archdiocese of Washington, which he had led since 2019.

Listen up

U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., and Republican Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia.

Today on “Politically Georgia,” Greg Bluestein and Tia Mitchell unpack the latest AJC poll showing a tight hypothetical U.S. Senate race between Republican Gov. Brian Kemp and incumbent Democratic U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff. Plus, they answer questions from the listener mailbag.

Have a question or comment for the show? Email us at politicallygeorgia@ajc.com or give us a call at 770-810-5297 and you could be featured on a future episode.

You can listen and subscribe to the show for free at Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

Today in Washington

• President Donald Trump will reportedly announce that the 2027 NFL draft will be held in Washington. He’ll also participate in another fundraising dinner for his MAGA Inc. PAC.
• The House and Senate return for evening votes.

Shoutouts

State Rep. Stacey Evans, D-Atlanta, first took office in 2021.

Today’s birthday:

• State Rep. Stacey Evans, D-Atlanta.

Belated birthdays:

• State Rep. Josh Bonner, R-Fayetteville (was Sunday).
• State Rep. Kasey Carpenter, R-Dalton (was Sunday).
• State Rep. Mitchell Horner, R-Ringgold (was Sunday).
• State Sen. Donzella James, D-Atlanta (was Saturday).
• First lady Marty Kemp (was Sunday).
• State Rep. Long Tran, D-Dunwoody (was Sunday).

Recognitions:

• State Rep. Sam Park, D-Lawrenceville, the House Minority Whip, was one of 19 new members chosen last week to join the NewDEAL (Developing Exceptional American Leaders), a national network of Democratic state and local elected officials with about 200 members across the country.
• State Rep. Bethany Ballard, R-Warner Robins, was named ALEC’s State Legislator of the Month. ALEC, which stands for the American Legislative Exchange Council, awards the honor to a lawmaker who “delivers meaningful policy victories and advance the cause of liberty in their states.”

Want a birthday shoutout in the Politically Georgia newsletter? There’s a form for that. Click here to submit the shoutouts. It’s not just birthdays. We’re also interested in new jobs, engagements, birth announcements, etc.

Before you go

A two-headed calf is shown in a display case at the Capitol Museum in Atlanta.

The New York Times compared President Donald Trump’s “imperviousness to the laws of political gravity” to a “two-headed cow,” which reminded us of this famous display at the Georgia Capitol Museum.