With attention in the General Assembly back on the push to legalize sports betting, advocates for casino gambling are taking new steps to press their case to lawmakers.
Pro-casino forces released a poll conducted in November by Glenn Bolger that showed two-thirds of Georgians support legalizing casino gambling, including 60% of Republicans and nearly three-quarters of Democrats.
And they’ve hired veteran wordsmith Dan McLagan to run an aggressive media strategy.
Our readers will recognize McLagan as the campaign flack behind former Agriculture Commissioner Gary Black, former U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, and many others. He once memorably compared the Herschel Walker campaign to “a plane crash into a train wreck that rolled into a dumpster fire. And an orphanage. Then an animal shelter.”
At the heart of the Georgia casino betting strategy is a push for a constitutional amendment to include sports betting, horse racing and casinos as a single package for approval, instead of stand-alone consideration of sports betting by itself.
“In the gaming arena, casinos are the big kahuna — the biggest job creator, the biggest revenue generator and the most popular of several popular options,” McLagan said.
“A bet’s a bet, and Georgia should go big and up our game as an economic powerhouse, tourist destination and job creator.”
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Credit: AJC
Credit: AJC
UNDER THE GOLD DOME (Legislative Day 8):
- 8:00 am: Committee meetings begin;
- 10:00 am: The House Convenes;
- 10:00 am: The Senate gavels in.
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STATE OF THE STATE. Gov. Brian Kemp delivered his 5th annual State of the State address on Wednesday from the state House chamber. Consider it his “To Do” list for the General Assembly, since he’ll need a legislative component for many of the workforce development, education, and health care initiatives he laid out.
Among the big-ticket items Kemp wants to see soon:
- A $2,000 teacher pay raise, teacher certification grants, fully funded Quality Basic Education, and a fully funded HOPE scholarship program for Georgia students;
- New penalties for human trafficking and gang recruitment, along with an unspecified solution to “the revolving door of criminal justice;”
- New funding for medical residencies; loan repayment for health care training; and TANF benefits for pregnant women.
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Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
COUNTER POINT. Georgia Democrats held a Capitol news conference immediately after Kemp’s State of the State address to push the governor to do much more than he proposed on health care, education, and affordable housing.
“We can do all these things to better the lives of Georgians,” said Senate Minority Leader Gloria Butler.
Among the items on their wish list:
- A full expansion of Medicaid;
- An increase of the state minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 an hour,
- A state child tax credit;
- A $10,000 teacher pay hike;
- A ballot initiative to ensure abortion rights;
- New gun restrictions.
State Sen. Elena Parent, D-Atlanta, later delivered the Democrats’ formal televised response.
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Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
Credit: Arvin Temkar/AJC
STATE OF EDUCATION. Although Gov. Brian Kemp devoted a lengthy portion of his State of the State address to education initiatives, Democrats in the Capitol accused him Wednesday of hoarding the state’s $6.1 billion surplus at educators’ expense.
The AJC’s Ty Tagami reports Democrats want a major increase in the Quality Basic Education formula and more.
They also called for an expansion of state spending on preschool. Currently, Georgia subsidizes a limited number of pre-kindergarten seats. Kids usually start pre-K at age 4, but Rep. Sam Park, D-Lawrenceville, the House minority whip, said state support should be extended to children as young as 3.
“Not only will investment in early childhood development and education better prepare the next generation for the future, it will help us end the school-to-prison pipeline at its root and build safer communities for generations to come," Park said.
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STATE OF HEALTH CARE. Aides to Gov. Brian Kemp estimated Monday that Kemp’s limited Medicaid expansion program will provide coverage for about 90,000 eligible low-income Georgians. That’s up from an earlier estimate of about 50,000, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s Ariel Hart reports.
Credit: Dreamstime/TNS
Credit: Dreamstime/TNS
But because Kemp’s program will require participants to work or perform certain activities to qualify, state officials say they expect the vast majority of the target population, about 280,000 eligible Georgians, will remain uninsured.
Democrats have pushed for a full Medicaid expansion instead. But the governor has maintained that work and activity requirements will motivate people to enter the workforce. Georgia has the third-highest rate of uninsured people in the country.
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OBAMACARE UP. Speaking of health care, the final Georgia figures are in for 2023 health insurance coverage under the Affordable Care Act, after the marketplace’s open enrollment closed Jan. 15. For ACA coverage in 2023, more than 879,000 Georgians enrolled.
That’s a 25% increase over 2022 plans. And that was on top of a 35% increase the year before, from 2021 to 2022.
The numbers come from a press call that Biden administration health officials including Secretary Xavier Becerra held with reporters Wednesday morning, about the same time that Kemp was preparing to give his State of the State address.
Both the Biden and Kemp administrations have taken credit for the surge in enrollment, especially for subsidies that made policies more affordable. Ariel Hart tells us she’ll be digging into the data to tell you more soon.
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TODAY IN WASHINGTON:
- The U.S. House and Senate are in session today;
- The Senate Foreign Relations Committee holds a hearing on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine;
- President Joe Biden travels to Springfield, Virginia, to deliver a major speech on his economic agenda.
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Credit: Scott McIntyre/The New York Times
Credit: Scott McIntyre/The New York Times
MTG ON BEING VP. U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene shrugged off a report from NBC News that she is angling to serve as former President Donald Trump’s running mate as he campaigns for a return to the White House in 2024.
Instead, Greene told our Insider Tia Mitchell that she is focused on her work in Washington, which includes serving on committees for the first time. Joining Trump’s ticket hasn’t crossed her mind, the Rome Republican insisted.
“It’s not something I’ve been thinking about,” she said Wednesday. “I’ve just been wanting committees for two years.”
Quoting former Trump aide Steve Bannon, NBC News reported Wednesday that the Georgia congresswoman envisions herself as vice president and has been working toward that goal as Trump makes an attempt to regain the presidency.
Greene said the article came as news to her and that she hadn’t had any conversations with Bannon on the subject.
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Credit: Nathan Posner for the AJC
Credit: Nathan Posner for the AJC
FLAT TAX ATTACK. President Joe Biden is traveling to a union hall in Virginia today, where he will deliver a major speech highlighting how the economy has fared during his first two years in office.
In the process, he is expected to lay into U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter’s national sales tax proposal, also known as the “fair tax” bill.
It’s the same bill that conservatives have introduced every session for more than a two decades, but the legislation drew new attention and derision after Carter, a Georgia Republican, received assurances from House Speaker Kevin McCarthy that it would at least get a vote in committee.
Tia spoke to Carter on Wednesday, and he described spending the last few days addressing criticism from Democrats and even some Republicans. The Wall Street Journal recently called a potential vote on the bill “masochistic.”
But Carter thinks the more people learn about the legislation, the better chances it has of passing in the House.
Even if it manages to get a favorable floor vote in that chamber, the bill is dead on arrival in the Senate.
And it’s clear that Democrats feel that a 30% national sales tax is not exactly a message that resonates with U.S. voters, which is why you can expect to hear much more from Biden and others about it.
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AS ALWAYS, Jolt readers are some of our favorite tipsters. Send your best scoop, gossip and insider info to patricia.murphy@ajc.com, tia.mitchell@ajc.com and greg.bluestein@ajc.com.
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