Despite a tough 2022 election for the Georgia GOP, lawmakers are pushing to the right on education, passage of a parental rights bill and changes to transport sports and “divisive concepts.”
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On the final day of their session, Georgia Republicans fought their way through a bill paving the way for restrictions on transgender children participating in school sports. Lawmakers passed a number of conservative education priorities this year. But Georgia voters have been pushing the other way — they voted for Joe Biden in 2020. WABE policy reporter Sam Gringlas tells us how this spate of education legislation could liven up this year’s midterms.
SAM GRINGLAS, BYLINE: For most of the day, legislation on trans children in sports seemed dead. Then, just after midnight, and at the urging of the Georgia governor, Republican lawmakers pushed the provision into another bill.
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SALLY HARRELL: Isn’t it true…
GEOFF DUNCAN: For what purpose is the senator rising from the 40th?
HARRELL: Parliamentary Inquiry.
DUNCAN: Formulate your request.
HARRELL: Isn’t it true that the anti-trans law is attached to this law that we’re not even allowed to see?
DUNCAN: I’m sure each and every member is capable of making that decision.
GRINGLAS: It passed without discussion. Democrats like Senator Sally Harrell were stunned.
HARRELL: I don’t think you want to hear the words I’m feeling right now.
GRINGLAS: She has a trans child.
HARRELL: And I have to tell my kid that’s how our government works.
GRINGLAS: In this session, Georgia lawmakers passed severe restrictions on how teachers talk about race, a law making it easier for parents to complain about books in school libraries, and a Parents’ Rights Act. Georgia’s electorate may have become more diverse, but Republicans have reason to believe their education bills will gain traction, especially in the hotly contested gubernatorial race. At last year’s Virginia governor’s race, Republican Glenn Youngkin campaigned to expose children and ban critical racial theories. He won, becoming Virginia’s first GOP governor in eight years.
CHUCK CLAY: If you don’t hear that message loud and clear, Democrat or Republican, you’re missing the boat.
GRINGLAS: Chuck Clay, a Republican lobbyist in Georgia, says Republicans looked to Virginia and saw that talking about education helped them walk a fine line — pleasing the party’s base and appealing to swing voters. Now, recent polls by Democrats suggest that older voters, not parents, may have been the real swing voters in Virginia. Still, an internal report by the Democratic Governors Association cited education as the top issue driving voters who voted for Biden in 2020 and Republican Glenn Youngkin a year later.
CLINT DIXON: Education issues will be a major factor in whether we 22 see a red wave in Georgia or a sustained blue wave.
GRINGLAS: Georgia Republican Senator Clint Dixon says he listened to his constituents when he wrote a bill that would allow parents to bar their children from school mask mandates.
DIXON: I tell some of my Senate colleagues that their main concern is election integrity. In Gwinnett, it’s education. I have parents who voted for my opponent last time and are now planning to vote for me because I raised these issues that are important to them.
GRINGLAS: There is also a risk that Republicans will go too far. Even conservative governors in Utah and Indiana have vetoed laws barring trans children from participating in school sports. Karen Watkins, a Democrat on the Gwinnett County School Board in Georgia, says these Republican bills intentionally focus on issues like race and gender.
KAREN WATKINS: I don’t see anything in any of these bills that is built on fear that would actually help the kids.
GRINGLAS: When Watkins won her seat in 2020, she was among the first black women to sit on the board. Watkins says these divisive bills and the politics around them are only raising the temperature.
WATKINS: It only worries me because education should be what brings us together, not separates, because that’s one thing we all have in common. It is the center of our community.
GRINGLAS: Watkins says the quality has gone down and she worries it may soon be too late to restore it. For NPR News, I’m Sam Gringglas in Atlanta.
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