Author Archives: Tammy Joyner

A Texas-based business group is suing Major League Baseball saying the organization had no right pulling its All-Star Game and Draft event from Atlanta in protest of Georgia’s new election reform law. The 21-page lawsuit, filed Monday in federal court in New York by the Job Creators Network, calls for the MLB to return the All-Star […]

More than 400 voter-restriction bills were considered in 47 states during the 2021 legislative session, according to a new Democracy Docket report. To date, some 25 Republican-sponsored bills, including one in Georgia, were signed into law. The legislative session is rapidly coming to a close nationwide. Read the full story on Atlanta Civic Circle.

Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms said Thursday the steady vitriol on social media didn’t influence her decision not to run for re-election. “It really did not. I, thankfully, have a lot of discipline as it relates to social media,” the mayor said during a conversation she had with former Secretary of State Condolezza Rice. “Even […]

Atlanta labor leaders, community groups and unemployed workers are protesting Gov. Brian Kemp’s recent decision to end supplemental federal unemployment aid. Last Thursday, Kemp said Georgia will no longer participate in the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program, which provides an additional $300 a week to Georgia’s unemployed. The PUA, which supplements unemployment pay, will end June […]

For the first time in 40 years, Georgia will not get any new congressional seats based on the latest federal census count. As a result, political power could shift in some Georgia counties when Georgia lawmakers begin redistricting later this year. The Urban League is hosting a series of one-hour town hall meetings beginning this week […]

The Jan 6 insurrection in The U.S. Capitol was a decisive stress test for American democracy. What can be done to reimagine and revitalize the tattered concept? What are the most critical elements of a healthy, strong, inclusive democracy in America? Some of the nation’s top political minds will try to answer those questions and […]

Betsy Fish has never been to Georgia, but that didn’t stop the Reno, Nev. high school teacher from launching a fundraiser to help Atlanta-area businesses affected by Major League Baseball’s decision to take its All-Star Game and Draft event elsewhere. The MLB left Georgia in protest over its new election reform law that some say will […]

One in four Georgians under supervised felony probation now qualify for early release from probation under a new reform measure signed into law on Monday. The measure is expected to save Georgia $34 million a year — money that normally would have been spent supervising people who qualify for early termination. Going forward, more people […]

It was a single question about continuing a penny sales tax in his rural southwest Georgia county, but voter Stancil Tootle will never know if his answer was what he intended. Tootle is blind, and while sighted voters take for granted their ability to visually verify their ballot choices, it requires the use of an […]

Alan Abramowitz Title: Professor of Political Science Organization: Emory University When local and national media needed to make sense of the most recent election season — which at times seemed senseless and mostly contentious — they turned to Alan Abramowitz. The Emory University political science professor has built an enviable reputation as one of the leading scholars […]

Shelby Swan Age: 27 Occupation: Marketing Residence: Cobb County Community work: Works with The People’s Uprising, a metro Atlanta coalition of organizers as well as ProtectTheVoteGa, a coalition of grassroots organizations in Georgia fighting to stop voter suppression. The weekend after the March 13, 2020, police-shooting death of a young black medical worker named Breonna Taylor, Cobb County resident Shelby Swan […]

Stella Silva-Garcia Age: 47 Occupation: Stay-at-home mom and co-owner of an information technology firm. Family: She and her husband have two sons, 22, and 9. Residence: Alpharetta Community work: No Safe Seats, a community group of suburban moms in North Fulton and Cobb counties. Georgia Familias Unidas, a group working with undocumented workers at poultry plants in Gainesville, Ga. Member of Protect […]

While Georgia lawmakers were enacting what some would call a regressive voting law last month, Virginia was creating landmark voting measures. Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam restored voting rights to ex-felons, overriding the state’s constitutional mandate that permanently disenfranchises citizens with past felony convictions. He also approved the Voting Rights Act of Virginia. Virginia is the first state […]

Alfred “Shivy” Brooks Age: 37 Occupation: Teaches economics, personal finance, and government at Charles Drew High School in Clayton County. Residence: East Atlanta Community work: Founded Teachers for Good Trouble. Member of NAACP Atlanta and The People’s Uprising, a nonprofit organization of elected officials, community residents, and college students. Don’t call Alfred Brooks a community organizer. “I’m a community change agent,” […]

Eldredge Washington Age: 31 Occupation: Entrepreneur, podcaster, and producer Residence: Atlanta’s West End Community work: Founder and executive director of Motivated Adults Developing Excellence (MADE). Protesting police killings. Saving long-forgotten black graves from the crush of bulldozers. Helping a toddler secure a much-needed kidney. Eldredge Washington has spent the last dozen years speaking up for people who can’t. Some days that […]

Hannah Gebresilassie (aka Hannah Joy)  Age: 30 Occupation: Journalist Background: Daughter of Ethiopian and Eritrean refugees who came to the United States in the 1980s. Residence: metro Atlanta Community work: Founded the Promote Positivity Movement in 2018. She also is involved in Optimize the Vizion; Justice for Georgia; and Habeshas Vote. It is the middle of the afternoon on an overcast Thursday in March. Hannah […]

This summer, Coloradans will enjoy the economic fruits of Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game, thanks to Georgia’s controversy over how it plans to handle future elections. In a last-ditch, good-riddance jab, Gov. Brian Kemp in an appearance on Fox News blasted MLB’s decision to leave Georgia for Colorado saying both states have similar voting regulations. So who’s […]

The fight over how Georgia will conduct future elections has gone straight for the wallet. Major League Baseball, the nation’s oldest professional sports league, pulled its prestigious All-Star Game and Draft out of Atlanta in protest of a new voting law. MLB’s departure will strip metro Atlanta businesses of millions of dollars in revenue. If anyone had […]

Major League Baseball threw Georgia an economic curveball Friday in protest of the state’s new controversial election law. The professional baseball association announced it will move the 2021 All-Star Game and MLB Draft, which was set for Atlanta this summer, to another yet-to-be-determined city. The decision to move the All-Star Game was “the best way […]

A driver who plows into a crowd of protestors blocking a street and injures or kills several people before driving away would conceivably be protected from prosecution while the protestors who blocked the street would face felonies. And if you’ve ever participated in any form of civil disobedience, you can kiss your chances of working […]