Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp signed an executive order Thursday aimed at preventing local governments from imposing COVID-19 restrictions such as mask mandates or vaccine requirements. Under the new rule, businesses can voluntarily comply with local rules, but they cannot be forced to do so.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services sent a letter to Kemp Thursday saying part of this second waiver plan “requires further evaluation” and requesting updated analysis by early next month. The state’s response will then be subjected to a 30-day comment period.
The Georgia Board of Education has scheduled a special called meeting Thursday to discuss Gov. Brian Kemp’s call to ban the teaching of “critical race theory” in Georgia public schools.
More than 300 bills and resolutions were sent to Gov. Brian Kemp's desk after the 2021 legislative session, from a massive elections overhaul to adoption reform to the $27.2 billion state budget. He only vetoed one of them.
Gov. Brian Kemp is set to sign a controversial bill to block local governments from slashing police budgets Friday as a Monday deadline looms for him to sign, veto or get out of the way of legislation passed in 2021.
Starting Thursday, Georgia’s months-long ban on gatherings of more than 50 people in one place will be lifted per orders from the governor, who has steadily moved to ease safety measures imposed since the virus swept the state in March last year.
Set to take effect on April 8, the rollback marks the broadest lifting of COVID-19 safety measures since the governor ended a statewide shelter-in-place order was in place for about three weeks last April.
The measure increases the state’s standard deduction, creating a modest tax break. For an individual, the tax relief will be about $46; married couples will see about $63 savings. The change will cost the state about $140 million.
High-ranking GOP state officials are objecting to a provision in the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill that blocks them from using the federal funds to pay for tax breaks.
The additional vaccine sites add to four other locations that opened last month in metro Atlanta, Macon, Albany and Habersham County. The new sites will open in Savannah, Columbus, Waycross and Bartow and Washington counties.
It was bill-wrangling season in the state legislature, and Gov. Brian Kemp was visiting Germany to talk economic ties when word came that the virus spreading from China into Europe could pose a serious threat for Georgia.
By early March, two people in the state had tested positive. Dozens more quickly followed, then the first death. The governor shut down the General Assembly’s legislative session, closed all the public schools and blanketed Georgia with shelter-in-place orders.
In the blink of an eye, the COVID-19 pandemic had swelled to dominate Kemp’s first two years in office as Georgia’s head of state.
A leading producer of electrostatic spray technology based on research conducted at the University of Georgia will expand its Georgia manufacturing operations, Gov. Brian Kemp announced Friday.
Sunrise, Fla.-based ByoPlanet International will create 250 jobs in Athens with a $7 million investment.
In the days after a pastor unknowingly spread COVID-19 at two funerals in Albany early this year, Gov. Brian Kemp looked to curb further spread of the virus. He issued a stay-at-home order, ordered the closure of some businesses and implored Georgians to avoid large funerals.
The outbreak spurred Georgia health officials to ban events of more than 50 people unless attendees practiced social distancing. But less than a month after urging Georgians to follow his advice, Kemp started attending funerals, memorial services and public viewings in ways that were at odds with his administration’s own guidelines, a Georgia Health News investigation found.
Unfounded conspiracy theories about the presidential election in Georgia hound Republican Gov. Brian Kemp even as he works to get the word out about Georgia’s new COVID-19 vaccination plan.
Following a COVID-19 update Tuesday inside the Capitol, Kemp was approached by a group of demonstrators with two large bags they said contained more than 2,000 letters urging Kemp to call a special session of the state Legislature to investigate claimed election irregularities and potentially change the results of Georgia’s election won by President-elect Joe Biden.
