Georgia voters elected 22 new members of the General Assembly in November, including an Army colonel, a college football coach, a university trustee and a helicopter pilot.
And that’s just Floyd Griffin.
This crop of new lawmakers all have varied backgrounds and took different paths to the Legislature. Here are a few of their stories.
INEVITABLE TEACHER. State Rep.-elect Bryce Berry’s political life is framed by violence — specifically, two shootings.
The first was the killing of Michael Brown by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, a suburb near his hometown of St. Louis. Berry was 13 at the time, and the killing got him involved in political organizing.
The second was last year when, as a middle school math teacher in Atlanta, one of Berry’s students witnessed his father being shot. Berry was surprised to hear the student call it “a normal thing.”
“That’s why I got into the race,” he said.
Berry defeated state Rep. Mesha Mainor, whose switch to the Republican Party last year made it impossible for her to win reelection in the heavily Democratic House District 56. He came to Atlanta as a student at Morehouse College. His mother was a teacher. So was his grandmother. But Berry majored in economics.
“I never wanted to teach, I never saw myself teaching and, of course, I ended up teaching,” he said.
Not surprisingly, he says public education will be his top issue in the Legislature. He wants to amend a law passed last year that lets public money go to private schools in a way that he says would “make outcomes better for our students.” But he knows changing the law will be difficult in a Republican-controlled Legislature.
“I’m a progressive,” he said. “But I’m a realist as well.”
BABY BONDS. Gov. Brian Kemp wants to give a portion of Georgia’s surplus back to taxpayers. But Robert Dawson wants him to think younger.
Dawson, elected in House District 65, wants lawmakers to consider giving future surpluses to newborns in Georgia. The money would collect interest in a savings account until the child is 18 and can use it to pay for college, job training or to start a business.
“I really want to find … what we have in common and do better for the future generations and the current citizens,” he said.
Dawson, a Democrat, ran for public office three times before, including bids for the mayor and City Council of South Fulton. But it wasn’t until this year he was successful. He won a majority in a four-way Democratic primary to avoid a runoff election and then coasted to victory in November with no opposition.
Dawson grew up in Birmingham, Alabama, where he attended a fine arts school focused on creative writing. He’s an IT consultant these days, despite, he says, having never taken a computer class.
The idea for “baby bonds” has been around for a while, mostly in liberal circles. California, Connecticut and Washington, D.C., have all passed some form of baby bond program.
ALL IN THE FAMILY. Hall County voters have swapped one Echols for another in the state Senate.
State Sen. Shelly Echols, R-Gainesville, decided to retire earlier this year to spend more time with her son, Cohen, a high schooler with Down syndrome. Voters chose her husband, Drew Echols, to replace her.
Echols is a fifth-generation farmer, growing peaches, pumpkins and strawberries at the legendary Jaemor Farms in Alto. While his farm saw little damage from the hurricanes that battered Georgia this year, he said he wants to try to make whole those who did lose their harvests.
One idea floated by legislative leaders is to repeal the gratuities clause in the state constitution, which prevents the Legislature from giving money to farmers without being repaid.
Echols said he might be interested in exploring that, but it would depend on how the proposal is crafted. He said he didn’t think farmers were interested in government handouts, but he said it might be worth exploring how to exempt them from the gratuities clause in times of disaster.
“I don’t know much about being a legislator, but I know don’t back yourself into a corner,” he said.
FULFILLING A DREAM. Robert Flournoy Jr. had always wanted to run for office. But it never seemed to work out. His job changed. His family changed, too.
When he decided to run in 2022, he was trounced in the Democratic primary. Flournoy’s wife had a dream that 2024 would be his year. But he wasn’t so sure.
Then his phone started ringing. There was an open seat in the state House, and people were asking him to run. He did things a little differently this time. His campaign was smaller and more focused. He won the Democratic primary by 148 votes. He still had trouble believing it.
Flournoy’s political pedigree dates to high school, where he was student government president. As a student at Georgia State, he was chair of the Student Advisory Council to the Board of Regents.
These days, he’s a property appraiser and a pastor. In the Legislature, he plans to advocate for public education, including focusing on teacher retention. But mostly, he plans to help the people of his district.
“This is a responsibility,” he said. “I’m proud to be a part.”
RURAL REPRESENTATIVE. Jaclyn Ford’s first job was walking behind the harvester on her parents’ South Georgia farm to pick up stray tobacco leaves.
In January, she’ll start her newest job: Georgia state representative.
A Republican, Ford grew up around politics. Her father was elected to the school board.
When veteran state Rep. Penny Houston didn’t seek reelection this year, Ford decided to run. She won the Republican primary with more than 80% of the vote and did not have an opponent in the general election.
“I’ve helped a lot of people with their campaigns, and people started asking me if I would run,” she said. “They thought I could do it, which made me think that I could do it, so I did. it.”
Ford has extensive experience with agriculture, lobbying for the Georgia Farm Bureau and serving on the Georgia Farm Service Agency State Committee.
She’s still involved in her family farm, which includes growing cotton and peanuts. They lost a lot of their crop during this year’s storms, which also damaged some of their property. In the Legislature, Ford said she wants to “listen and learn” during her first year while representing rural Georgia.
“Sometimes living outside of the metro area you feel like you’re less important,” she said. “I just want to make sure that my district and my people here are represented.”
HE’S BACK. Floyd Griffin has many titles: Army colonel, college football coach, state senator, mayor, university trustee.
Now he’s got another one to add to the list: Georgia state representative.
Griffin defeated Republican state Rep. Ken Vance in the newly redrawn House District 149. He’ll return to the state Capitol in January as a lawmaker for the first time since the mid-1990s, when he served two terms in the state Senate.
Throughout his career, Griffin has been used to going first. Many times in the military he found himself to be the first Black person serving in his role. He was the first African American to represent a majority white district in the Georgia Senate. And in 2002, he was elected the first Black mayor of Milledgeville.
But his political career, which has spanned three decades, has also been marked by defeat. He made an unsuccessful run for lieutenant governor in 1998. Voters later ousted him after one term as mayor of Milledgeville. He ran for secretary of state in 2022 but lost in the Democratic primary.
“It’s tough being the first Black person in any major position of responsibility,” he said. “Every time I have won an election to include the one that I just won, I always won against an incumbent. And a white incumbent.”
This most recent election was different because a judge ordered the district to be redrawn to make it majority Black. Griffin said it’s the first election he’s ever had where he knew he could win.
Griffin says he plans to introduce some legislation, but he’s not ready to announce it just yet. He wants to focus on education — particularly higher education — along with voting and abortion rights.
“I don’t know how long I’m going to stay. I’m going to stay as long as I feel I can serve,” the 80-year-old Griffin said. “But at the same time, I am going to be looking for that person that should replace me.”
CAREER CHANGE. Tangie Herring wanted to be an actress. She took a gap year to make a go of it, but nothing happened. She became a schoolteacher instead.
Decades later, Herring moved back to Macon with plans to retire in December 2025. But this time something did happen.
She ran for office and won what turned out to be one of the closest elections in the state.
“I was always taught by my mom and dad, if you see a problem stop talking about it. What are you going to do about it?” said Herring, a Democrat.
Herring’s career change wasn’t completely unexpected. She had founded a nonprofit that promoted civic engagement with young people. Back in Macon, Herring said she started looking for ways to get involved. That’s when it hit her.
“Why not me,” she said. “Why don’t I just run to help create the change that I want to see.”
It wasn’t easy. In the Democratic primary, she faced Juawn Jackson, a former Bibb County school board president. In the general election, she won by less than 300 votes.
Herring plans to advocate for teachers in the Legislature, including making sure “we are paying our teachers more and providing incentives for them to want to stay in the profession.”
And she wants to help form partnerships between industry and public schools to “revolutionize vocational training” in a way that gives more opportunities for students.
NICKNAMES THAT STICK. Growing up a preacher’s kid, Justin “Jutt” Howard was always mowing somebody’s lawn, painting somebody’s house or cleaning somebody’s gutters. He turned that work into a business, starting his own company as a teenager. He was so successful he even hired a few employees.
Now Howard will have a new job to add to his resume: state representative. The Republican won a seat in House District 71.
“I’ve always been interested in politics, I loved debating politics throughout the years with friends,” he said.
Born in Auburn, Alabama, Howard said he moved to Carrollton with his family when he was just a few months old. He got his nickname, “Jutt,” because that’s how his older brother pronounced “Justin” as a kid.
Howard said he supports tax incentives for safe gun storage, a proposal that did not become law last year. And he said he is “adamant” about preventing transgender women from competing in women’s sports — an issue he’ll likely get to vote on during the session.
But mostly his focus will be on “learning as much as I can” about the legislative process.
ROAD LESS TRAVELED. In business and politics, state Rep.-elect Anissa Jones has always known where she’s going. She’s just taken a different route to get there.
She was all set to go to medical school to become an OB-GYN. But instead, she went on to become a chiropractor, inspired by her grandmother’s homemade salves to tend to her childhood wounds.
“It really sparked something within me, just a different alternative to health care,” she said.
In politics, the conventional path would be to start either on the county commission or city council. Instead, Jones set her sights on the Macon Water Authority, defeating a longtime incumbent.
“I was very strategic on where I wanted to start,” she said. “You cannot start a business, you cannot bring a development to the area without water. They’re going to call you first.”
Jones, a Democrat, will replace state Rep. James Beverly, the House minority leader who opted not to run for reelection.
Like most new lawmakers, Jones said she plans to “listen, learn and collaborate” during her first term. But she hopes to continue her work on economic development.
One idea is to sponsor a bill to encourage the use of recyclable materials in residential home construction, with a goal of reducing waste and making homes more affordable.
MORE VOICES. The Georgia Senate’s LGBTQ+ caucus will soon double in size.
RaShaun Kemp’s victory in Senate District 38 comes nearly four years after Kim Jackson made history as the state’s first openly LGBTQ+ senator.
“I think it’s important to have voices from all walks of life as policy and decisions are being made,” said Kemp, a Democrat who is the parent of two children along with his husband in Atlanta
Kemp grew up in Columbus, Ohio, where he was raised by a great-grandmother who always read the newspaper. He studied political science in college but said he felt pressure to become a doctor or a lawyer because he was the first in his family to graduate.
It was volunteering with his church to help children learn to read that convinced him he should become a teacher. He taught high school math and social studies before eventually becoming principal of a dropout prevention charter school in Ohio.
He moved to Atlanta about 13 years ago, drawn by the city’s vibrant Black culture. He worked for the Georgia Charter School Association and helped pass the state’s charter school amendment in 2012.
After losing a Democratic primary for the House in 2022, he ran this year to replace retiring state Sen. Horacena Tate of Atlanta. He won the Democratic primary and then coasted to an uncontested victory in November.
Kemp wants to focus on children’s literacy, noting that many Georgia children aren’t reading at grade level.
“One thing I am encouraged by here in Georgia, even though politics is going to be politics, there is a certain collegiality that exists,” he said. “I think that there are some opportunities to find some common ground.”
SOAKING IT UP. Mekyah McQueen wasn’t looking to run for office. She had recently returned to the United States after seven years of teaching overseas. Both of her parents had died. She was in “survival mode.”
But things changed when she was nominated for a candidate training program through Emerge Georgia. Now, she’s preparing to take her seat in House District 61.
McQueen spent her early life in New Jersey, moving to Georgia when she was 9 after her father opened an auto repair shop in Atlanta. She was student government president of her middle school (“An upset. I was not the favorite,” she said) and an all-state clarinet player in high school.
McQueen has some big goals for her first few years in the Legislature, including looking at the school funding formula and searching for ways to improve transportation. But much of her first session will be learning how to do the job.
“I feel like a sponge in front of a fire hydrant,” she said.
SHARECROPPERS’ SON. L.C. Myles Jr. was a teenager when civil rights activist Medgar Evers was shot and killed in rural Mississippi.
“My mother knew his people. We went over there and consoled them,” he said.
It was that experience that launched Myles’ civil rights activism, a path that — decades later — led him to the Georgia House of Representatives.
Myles’ parents were sharecroppers in Bolton, a town just outside of Jackson, Mississippi. He was later drafted and served a tour of duty in the Vietnam War. When he came back, he stayed in the military and made a career out of it, retiring as a first sergeant.
He became involved in the Richmond County Democratic Party, helping recruit Gloria Frazier to run for House District 126. Eighteen years later, it was Frazier who recruited Myles to take her place.
In the Legislature, Myles said he wants to bring more infrastructure to his district, including better broadband access. He wants to push for fully expanding Medicaid in Georgia, a cause Democrats have been pushing unsuccessfully for years. And he wants to help rural hospitals.
“Our rural hospitals are really suffering right now, and I would like to at some point come up with a rural hospital rescue plan,” he said.
ASPIRATIONAL. Gabriel Sanchez got elected to the Georgia House of Representatives this year as a Democrat. But there’s another word after his name that has gotten more attention: socialist.
The son of Colombian immigrants was endorsed by the Atlanta Democratic Socialists of America. He surprised people earlier this year in the Democratic primary when he defeated state Rep. Teri Anulewicz in a Smyrna-based House district.
Sanchez mostly grew up in Marietta, but two things shaped his life. First, his father lost his business in the recession of the late 2000s and moved the family to a cramped apartment in Miami.
Second, he was attending Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School in Miami when a fellow student, Trayvon Martin, was shot and killed — one of many tragic incidents that have launched a reckoning about race in the past decade plus.
He wants to legalize rent control and raise the minimum wage to $20 per hour. He has also set his sights on repealing Georgia’s “right to work” law that allows workers to not join or pay fees to a labor union.
Sanchez calls those bills “aspirational” because he knows they have zero chance of passing in a Republican-controlled Legislature. But he said he’s not just here to make noise and is aiming to also find bills that have bipartisan support.
KEEP WALKING. Kenya Wicks’ foot hurt after a long day of campaigning for the state Senate. But this wasn’t soreness. She had a broken bone.
“I was out in a boot. I didn’t care,” she said. “Me and my boot kept walking.”
Wicks says she eventually knocked on something like 7,000 doors during her campaign, winning a runoff in the Democratic primary on her way to a convincing general election victory in Senate District 34.
Wicks said she gets her determination from her late grandmother, who raised her in Louisville, Kentucky, and brought her along on lots of volunteer work.
Wicks spent 30 years in the U.S. Army, a tenure that she said included deployments to Iraq, Somalia and Turkey. She retired and settled in Fayetteville, where she met state Sen. Valencia Seay, D-Riverdale. Wicks spent two years as Seay’s chief of staff. She then ran for the Senate when Seay decided not to seek reelection.
In the Legislature, Wicks said she wants to focus on health care, higher education and veterans issues.
“I’m just excited for January to get started,” she said.
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