Parent Press Week 4 of the 2026 Legislative Session
February is here and, according to Punxsutawney Phil, we are in store for six more weeks of winter. You’ll stay warm though, because these are heating up at the Capitol.
Election Politicking
Last Monday, Senate Republicans passed SR 563. The resolution directs Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to turn over your personal information from Georgia’s voter roles to the Trump Administration. This action was taken by Senate Republicans to placate Donald Trump and further meddle in our elections ahead of the November midterms and to help the Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones’ primary campaign for Governor against Raffensperger. This resolution came less than a week after the FBI raided a Fulton County elections facility to snatch ballots from the 2020 election.
Now is not the time to play partisan politics with our elections, least of all when it involves surrendering state sovereignty over elections management to the federal government of a man who cannot admit he lost the 2020 election. Republicans are actively selling out Georgia to fraudsters in Washington.
Debate on the Property Tax
Last Tuesday, we debated property tax in the Senate. Republicans introduced SB 382, which would cap how much property taxes can be increased each year. The bill was passed on a party line vote. Unfortunately for our local governments, the bill would unfairly punish them by limiting their revenue source and having a downwardly negative impact on local budgets for education, infrastructure, and public safety. We passed that same bill 2 years ago, then there was a hard-fought compromise with the House and Senate Democrats and Republicans and there was a Constitutional amendment in HB 581. This amendment was adopted after 70% of voters voted for the amendment in 2024, but there was an opt-out provision in the bill. Now, Republicans are mad that most counties and school systems opted out.
It is rich that the Republicans are lecturing local governments and Democrats on property taxes. These same people who have not expanded Medicaid and are seeing hundreds of thousands become newly uninsured daily while wasting $110 million on the failed Pathways program. These same Republicans have pushed cost after cost onto the local governments through dictates and mandates while cutting funding the state used to provide. These cuts impact our elections, transportation for public schools, and health care for some public school workers. If there was something that was hitting our state’s budget, Republicans would not be so cavalier, but because it is the locals they just go ahead and do it.
A Leap for Literacy
I am very excited to share with all of you that both Chambers filed the Georgia Early Literacy Act of 2026. As you may know, I have been championing students’ right to read for many years and being a part of this big step towards Georgia’s literacy efforts is truly what makes this work worthwhile. Senate Bill 459 and House Bill 1193 intends to provide early literacy support; literacy coaches within each K-3 school, screenings for dyslexia and other reading disabilities and prompt intervention, and early assessments to ensure students are ready for first grade. I am excited to see this effort in action and ultimately, more capable and confident children. If you are interested in learning more about how this legislation will benefit future readers, look here.
Medicaid Coverage for Heart Transplants
Yesterday, I introduced a bill, SB 481, to require Medicaid to cover heart and lung transplants in Georgia. Our state is the ONLY state with transplant capability but no requirement for Medicaid to cover these treatments. I am proud to work on this issue in concert with Emory University, Piedmont Hospital, and the Medical Association of Georgia.
My bill would direct the Department of Community Health to cover heart and lung transplants when they are deemed necessary by medical professionals in Georgia’s hospitals. Such action is long overdue. Currently, patients with advanced heart and lung failure often require multiple hospitalizations each year, costing $150,000 and $250,000 per patient. The average cost of a heart transplant is $350,000 to $400,000 and a lung transplant is $350,000, meaning that it most often LOWERS the cost to Medicaid to do a transplant versus the alternatives to help these patients survive.
Body Cameras for ICE Agents
Untrained, unqualified ICE agents are brutalizing Americans and their neighbors in the streets of our country. When we see injustice as members of this body, we have a duty to respond. I introduced a bill, SB 483, to require all ICE agents in Georgia to wear body cameras so we — legislators and members of the public alike — can hold these agents accountable when they are on the job.
If ICE is really just another layer of law enforcement, let’s require them to follow the same rules that most cops in Georgia follow. My bill would do just that and provide an extra layer of protection for both the officers and members of the public.
And requiring ICE agents to wear body cameras might just stop some of them from taking out their unsatisfied rage on innocent people. Just a thought.
Who Runs the World? Girls!
I had Reverend Natosha Reid Rice down at the Capitol this week as my Pastor of the Day honoree. Reverend Rice serves as Vice President of Housing Opportunities and Mission Engagement at Habitat for Humanity International, where she leads the organization’s global HOME strategy. Earlier, in her role as Associate General Counsel, she developed and oversaw financing initiatives that expanded access to capital for affordable housing projects across the United States. Beyond Habitat, she has extensive faith-based leadership experience, having spent over a decade as an Associate Pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church and now serving as Minister for Public Life at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Atlanta.
Her message can be found here.
This week, I also hosted the Girl Scouts at the Capitol. I am so proud of the work these girls do every day becoming young civic leaders. As a former Girl Scout myself, the values and principles I learned have informed my path through public service. My hope is that with continued investment Girl Scouts around the country carry on harnessing these skills and applying them the rest of their lives.
Republican Tax Bill Scam
Senate Republicans introduced SB 476 and SB 477, bills that would lower the state’s income tax from 5.19% to 4.99% next year and raise the standard deduction while eliminating all income tax credits by 2023 (SB 476), and then from 4.99% to 3.99% in 2028 (SB 477). The eventual goal for state Republicans is the elimination of the state income tax by 2032.
Senate Democrats support real tax relief for working Georgians, not pipe dreams which will save the most money for the wealthiest in our state. How do I know that’s what it will do? The Republican sponsors violated the Senate Rules and passed it with no testimony and no fiscal analysis to back up their claims. Believe me, if the bill did what they claim it does and saved money for the average Georgian, they’d be tripping over themselves to show you the numbers.
Look – eliminating certain corporate tax breaks, especially ineffective giveaways like the data center credit, is a step in the right direction. If Republicans are finally acknowledging that some tax incentives amount to corporate welfare, Democrats welcome that conversation, and I am sure most taxpayers will too.
However, pairing those changes with a long-term push to eliminate the state income tax is more than concerning, it is reckless. The income tax is Georgia’s largest and most reliable source of revenue used to fund public schools and universities, rural hospitals and health care access, transportation and infrastructure, and public safety. Removing that revenue without a credible replacement would either force massive cuts to essential services or shift the burden onto working families through higher sales and property taxes. States without an income tax typically rely more heavily on regressive sales taxes that fall hardest on middle-class and low-income families. We’d have to tax groceries, prescription drugs, doctors’ visits – and nearly double the tax on everyday items like toilet paper, eggs, milk, diapers, etc. Watch my Instagram and Facebook pages for updates!
Back to Their Old Tricks
I don’t think the rollout of the Tax Scam Plan has been as effective as LG Jones and Appropriations Chairman Tillery were hoping for. I have heard many Republicans who, in public and in private, have said it’ll never pass and it’s just election year politics. I call BS on that, because you should not just be lying to the public. But, the real evidence is that after the hearing on the bills where they violated so many rules and couldn’t answer any questions while weaving a fairy tale, they sprung 2 anti-trans bills on us on the floor today. One would ban puberty blockers for minors – the Senate has passed this several times before. Hopefully the House will stop it again. More research is needed on puberty blockers for youth in this context, but I am not for a ban. I definitely don’t trust these folks with my medical decisions and I don’t think families with trans kids should have to either. The other bill would eliminate the ability for any State employee who is trans and on the State Health Benefit Plan to get gender transition surgery or hormones through their health insurance. These are adults who are paying for health care. They are following Donald Trump’s playbook to try to erase transgender people in our society. I voted against these bills and our Caucus urged the Republican Senators to stop using culture war bills as a shiny object to distract from their failure to work on issues that Georgians actually care about, like the cost of housing and childcare.