ATLANTA, Ga. â The closing bell of the 2021 General Assembly is set to toll on March 31 â Sine Die â giving state lawmakers only a handful of days to debate and act upon legislation before the 40-day session concludes.
The long list of bills under consideration at the start of the session in January was significantly narrowed after Crossover Day on March 8.
The 30th day of the 40-day session is the deadline for bills to pass out of at least one chamber, House or Senate, to be considered in that session.
In a session dominated by debate over voting rights and gambling, education bills still garnered attention. Consensus formed around Gov. Brian Kempâs budget bill which restored previous cuts to funding, but deep divides remain over vouchers for private schools, transgender rights in high school sports, charter school funding and other issues that appear annually.
State Reps. Philip Singleton, Marty Harbin and Rick Jasperse filed bills targeting transgender student-athletes.
Four anti-transgender bills – including three targeting student-athletes – stalled this week at the Gold Dome after failing to meet a key deadline, meaning they are likely dead for the legislative session.
LGBTQ activists cautioned that the bills could resurface as amendments to other legislation before lawmakers head home on March 31.
One of the anti-trans bills – Senate Bill 266 from Sen. Marty Harbin, a Republican from Tyrone – was on a fast-track for approval. But the Georgia Senate did not schedule it for a floor vote on Monday, which was Crossover Day. Bills are dead for the session if they don’t pass one chamber of the General Assembly by then.
State Sen. Chuck Hufstetler, a Republican from Rome. (Photo courtesy Georgia Senate)
The Georgia Senate overwhelmingly approved a bill to modernize the stateâs HIV laws on Monday. The bipartisan show of support impressed HIV activists fighting for years to reform state laws that criminalize HIV.
Senate Bill 164 won approval with a 50-2 vote. The bill from Sen. Chuck Hufstetler, a Republican from Rome, passed on Crossover Day â the deadline to keep the measure alive for the remainder of the legislative session.Â
âWe are extremely pleased that this bill passed the Senate with such a strong bipartisan majority vote,â said Jeff Graham, executive director of Georgia Equality. âFrankly, itâs even stronger bipartisan support than we saw when the same legislation passed the House last year.â
March 11, 2021
Photograph by Megan Varner/Getty Images
Opponents of several voting bills introduced during Georgia’s current legislative session say Republican lawmakers are attempting to restrict access to the polls in response to three major recent losses Georgia voters recently elected a Democratic president for the first time in nearly thirty years, along with not one but two Democratic U.S. Senators. And while critics say they expected some legislation aimed at Georgia’s elections system, the proposed bills have been more egregious than they initially anticipated.
After Monday’s Crossover Day, 12 different bills remain alive in the House and Senate and could make a variety of drastic changes to Georgia’s elections laws, including doing away with no-excuse absentee voting, requiring absentee voter ID, restricting the locations of ballot drop boxes, and limiting the hours for early voting, among other restrictions. Republicans in support of the bills say the changes are
Atlanta Magazine Here’s what’s going on with voting legislation in Georgia and why opponents.
Here’s what’s going on with voting legislation in Georgia and why opponents say it’s clear “voter suppression”
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Photograph by Megan Varner/Getty Images
Opponents of several voting bills introduced during Georgia’s current legislative session say Republican lawmakers are attempting to restrict access to the polls in response to three major recent losses Georgia voters recently elected a Democratic president for the first time in nearly thirty years, along with not one but two Democratic U.S. Senators. And while critics say they expected some legislation aimed at Georgia’s elections system, the proposed bills have been more egregious than they initially anticipated.