Tag: Gov. Kemp

Backlash grows against Georgia voting rights law

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Georgia lawmakers are on defense as prominent companies and business executives have come out in opposition to legislation signed into law by Gov. Brian Kemp (R) that has been criticized as an effort to stifle minority voters.

Georgia-based Coca-Cola and Delta on Wednesday joined a growing number of corporations this week criticizing the omnibus bill, S.B. 202.

Coca-Cola CEO James Quincey called the new measures “unacceptable” and “a step backwards,” while Delta CEO Ed Bastian said the bill “includes provisions that will make it harder for many underrepresented voters, particularly Black voters, to exercise their constitutional right to elect their representatives.” Continue reading.

Michael Steele predicts GOP electoral catastrophe after Brian Kemp signs voter suppression bill

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Republicans in the Georgia legislature on Thursday passed a 95-page voter suppression bill through both chambers in one day. Republican Gov. Brian Kemp then signed the legislation into law.

For analysis, MSNBC chief legal correspondent Ari Melber interviewed former Republican National Committee Chair Michael Steele.

“The question to reps and voters in Georgia and Arizona and elsewhere, who are taking rights away from Black people across this country in places like Philadelphia, Atlanta, Detroit, how do you think this ends?” he asked. “How do you think this ends? Do you think black folks will just sit by and let you get away with this?” Continue reading.

‘Jim Crow 2.0’: Georgia Dem lays out the hardships the state’s ‘cruel’ and draconian new voter suppression law will cause

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In Georgia, State Rep. Donna McLeod was among the Democrats who fought hard against the voter suppression bill that Gov. Brian Kemp signed into law on Thursday, March 25 — and the next morning, McLeod did not mince words when she slammed the law as “White supremacy” and “Jim Crow 2.0” during an appearance on CNN’s “New Day.”

McLeod, who was first elected to the Georgia House of Representatives in 2016, told CNN hosts Alisyn Camerota and John Berman, “I live in Gwinnett County. We have endured lines every single election. This is just going to create more lines because you’re not giving people more options to vote. And with longer lines, that means you’re going to have people that will probably not want to vote anymore.”

Georgia’s new law goes out of its way to make voting more difficult in the Peach State, from limiting early voting to making absentee voting more complicated to reducing the number of ballot drop boxes. And the law is so draconian that it even makes it a crime to give food or water to someone who is waiting in line to vote. Continue reading.

Georgia Rep. charged with felonies for knocking on Kemp’s door as he signed voter suppression bill

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Democratic Georgia State Rep. Park Cannon was arrested and reportedly charged with two felonies late Thursday for knocking on Republican Gov. Brian Kemp’s office door as he signed into law a sweeping voter suppression bill that aims to curtail ballot drop boxes, impose more strict voter ID requirements for absentee ballots, and give the GOP legislature significant control over the state election board.

Video footage posted online shows Cannon, who represents Georgia’s 58th House district, exchanging words with a state trooper standing in front of Kemp’s closed office door as the governor moved to grant the omnibus election bill final approval just hours after the 96-page measure cleared both the House and Senate Thursday afternoon.

“The governor is signing a bill that affects all Georgians,” a person standing behind Cannon said as the lawmaker spoke with the state trooper. “Why is he doing it in private? And why is he trying to keep elected officials who are representing us out of the process?” Continue reading.

Trump calls Georgia governor to pressure him for help overturning Biden’s win in the state

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How Trump’s fraud claims could backfire on the GOP in Georgia’s runoff elections | The 2020 FixThe Fix’s Amber Phillips analyzes how some of the rhetoric from Trump allies could depress Republican turnout ahead of the Georgia Senate runoff elections. (Blair Guild, JM Rieger/The Washington Post)

The governor later referred to his conversation with Trump in a midday tweet, noting that he told the president that he’d already publicly advocated for a signature audit.

Kemp’s spokesman, Cody Hall, confirmed that the two men spoke. Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh declined to comment. Continue reading.

Gov. Kemp Apologizes For Gross Distortions Of Covid-19 Data

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has been widely criticized by health experts for prematurely reopening non-essential businesses in his state, and even President Donald Trump — who has been calling for states to ease coronavirus-related restrictions sooner rather than later — asserted that Kemp was moving too quickly. Now, more criticism is coming Kemp’s way over reports that the Georgia Department of Public Health’s website showed a decrease in new coronavirus infections in parts of the state where no such decreases were occurring.

Journalists Willoughby Mariano and J. Scott Trubey of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution explain, “In the latest bungling of tracking data for the novel coronavirus, a recently posted bar chart on the Georgia Department of Public Health’s website appeared to show good news: new confirmed cases in the counties with the most infections had dropped every single day for the past two weeks. In fact, there was no clear downward trend. The data is still preliminary, and cases have held steady or dropped slightly in the past two weeks.”

After “more than a day of online mockery, public concern and a letter from a state representative,” Mariano and Trubey report, the Georgia Department of Public Health changed the graph on Monday morning, May 18. Continue reading.

GOP Gov. Brian Kemp’s elevation of pseudostupidity is a Trump characteristic that endangers us all: clinical psychiatrist

AlterNet logoGov. Brian Kemp (R) dumbfounded and dismayed many recently with his decision to allow nonessential businesses to reopen in Georgia when even Trump said this move is too soon. It followed Kemp’s astonishing announcement earlier this month that he had not known asymptomatic people could transmit the highly contagious coronavirus, although every governor in the country had previously been briefed on this. His behavior left many wondering if Kemp really could be that clueless or whether something else is going on.

As a clinical psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, I am often faced with untangling questions like these: Are people genuinely unable to grasp a concept, or are they hiding knowledge from themselves for some reason unknown even to them, or are they aware they know better but are simply pretending not to know? Bluntly, are they just plain stupid (genuinely of low intelligence) or more insidiously pseudostupid—feigning a lack of understanding that can serve various motives and purposes? As a concerned Georgia resident, Kemp’s handling of this pandemic has resurfaced this question for me front and center.

Kemp ran as a gun toting conservative and may truly believe no invisible enemy is going to get the better of him or his constituents. This would be an example of a kind of everyday denial—”I can smoke all I want, cancer’s never going to get me.” That’s just plain stupid. Or he may understand fully the risks of his decision but realize his political survival depends on the success of his gamble. His preposterous disclaimer in early April followed now by his decision to throw caution to the wind then would exemplify pseudostupidity. Continue reading.