ATHENS — Just as lawmakers gathered for this year’s legislative session, Gov. Brian Kemp warned that an overhaul of state litigation rules would spill into 2025. On Wednesday, he assured business leaders it remains atop his agenda next year.
Speaking at the Georgia Chamber’s congressional luncheon, the governor said he plans to hold a listening tour and three roundtables ahead of a new push for what conservatives call a “tort reform” rewrite that has long bedeviled political leaders.
It was a familiar theme from Kemp, who surprised many executives at the same event last year by outlining his support for the initiative. He told the audience on Wednesday that he’s confident he’ll broker a “quality solution to out-of-control prices.”
The governor is plunging into a thorny fight that will test his political clout as his second term inches closer to its end. It pits corporate leaders, medical organizations and the insurance industry against a powerful network of trial lawyers opposing changes.
Doctors and hospitals say the measures would help lure more physicians to Georgia, while business lobbies promise that speedier out-of-court settlements and limits on jury awards will help lower insurance premiums and cut legal costs.
Trial lawyers and patient advocacy groups, meanwhile, frame the legislation as a giveaway to powerful corporations that would rob Georgians of their legal rights.
Last year, Kemp used his keynote speech at the Georgia Chamber’s annual meeting to vow to reshape the regulations guiding plaintiffs’ litigation — and then backed it up with a six-figure media campaign that savaged “senseless regulations.”
But Kemp announced it would be a multiyear effort as the legislative session began, with the Republican saying he needed more time to gather industry data to ready a campaign for a broader overhaul in 2025.
At the time, some involved in the discussions say it was doubtful whether they had the votes to muscle the legislation through the General Assembly amid internal dissension.
Instead, a more narrowly tailored version of legislation that dealt with how those injured in truck driver-related accidents can sue insurance companies was enacted at the urging of Lt. Gov. Burt Jones.
And Kemp signed legislation this year that paves the way for the collection of insurance data to paint a portrait of the state’s litigation climate.
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