East Cobb Politics & Elections

Ga. redistricting maps thrown out; special session called

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Richardson Congressional campaign kickoff
The Congressional maps passed in 2021 substantially redrew the 6th District that once included most of East Cobb.

Georgia lawmakers will be called to a special session to redraw the state’s Congressional and legislative maps after a federal judge ruled Thursday that they violate civil rights law.

U.S. District Court Judge Steve Jones in Atlanta said the maps drawn by the Georgia legislature in 2021 substantially diluted minority voting strength, especially in parts of metro Atlanta, under the U.S. Voting Rights Act.

Gov. Brian Kemp has signed an order calling for a Nov. 29 special session after Jones ordered new maps be completed by Dec. 8.

Among the particulars in Jones lengthy ruling (you can read it here) is the creation of a majority-black Congressional district in the western part of metro Atlanta, and several majority-black legislative districts in the Atlanta and Macon areas.

The plaintiffs included a number of civil rights organizations, the Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, the African Methodist Episcopal Church in Georgia and individuals alleging their voting rights have been diminished due to the 2021 reapportionment.

They cited black population growth in Georgia over the last two decades that has not been reflected in political representation in the U.S. House and legislature.

Nine of Georgias’s 14 Congressional seats are held by Republicans, including three who represent portions of Cobb County.

Georgia’s black population has grown by 484,048 people since 2010, while the white population fell by 51,764.

“In the last decade, all of Georgia’s population growth was attributable to the minority population, however, the number of majority-Black congressional and legislative districts remained the same,” Jones wrote in his ruling.

“Based on the 2020 Census, the combined Black population in Cobb, Fulton, Douglas, and Fayette Counties is 807,076 persons, more than necessary to constitute an entirely AP Black congressional district—or a majority in two congressional districts.”

That could affect how Congressional lines are drawn in the East Cobb area. Until 2021, East Cobb was mostly contained in the 6th Congressional District.

That was represented from 2019-2022 by black Democrat Lucy McBath after many years of GOP representation, including former House Speaker Newt Gingrich.

But the redrawn map included a lesser portion of the 6th District in East Cobb and pulled in some of the 11th District, aimed at ensuring Republican seats.

The 6th now includes some of north Fulton, Forsyth and Dawson counties, which are conservative.

McBath moved to the 7th Congressional District, based in Gwinnett County, after that. Rich McCormick, a conservative Republican, won the 6th and veteran GOP House member Barry Loudermilk was re-elected in the 11th.

Jake Orvis, a McBath spokesman, issued a statement Thursday saying that she “applauds the court for upholding the principles of fair and equal representation. While the outcome of the process remains unclear, one thing is certain: Rep. McBath will not be letting Republicans in the state legislature determine when her work serving Georgians is done.”

Jerica Richardson, a Cobb Commissioner from District 2 in East Cobb, has announced she is running for the 6th District seat, and she has been campaigning in Dawson and Forsyth.

After being drawn out of her commission seat that expires at the end of 2024—and for which a home rule dispute is still pending in Cobb Superior Court—she said in a statement Thursday that while she agrees with the ruling, it doesn’t change her plans to seek federal office.

“This race for me was never about this court decision,” Richardson said. “From day one, I’ve made it clear I was committed to representing the 6th district and bringing back compassionate leadership to our community.”

She said regardless of how the new lines are drawn, “I’m here to represent the people, to fight for their issues, needs, and concerns. I am grateful to today’s decision, and am more committed than ever to winning this race.”

One of the plaintiffs in the voting rights lawsuit is Coakley Pendergrass, an associate pastor at Turner Chapel AME in Marietta and a community and faith leader who lives in the redrawn 11th District.

Jones said in his ruling that Pendergrass and his related plaintiffs “have shown that Georgia’s Black population in west-metro Atlanta is geographically compact to comprise a majority of the voting age population in an additional congressional district.”

The 2021 maps included a portion of South Cobb in the 14th District, represented by Republican firebrand Marjorie Taylor Greene.

Jones’ ruling is the second by a federal judge ordering new maps in Southern states under the Voting Rights Act. The Alabama legislature was ordered earlier this year to create a new map with an additional black-majority seat in the southern part of the state.

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Cobb schools redistricting plaintiffs file for injunction

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Cobb schools redistricting plaintiffs file for injunction
Cobb Board of Education electoral maps before 2022 reapportionment (left) and after (right).

Attorneys for plaintiffs seeking new electoral maps for the Cobb County Board of Education have filed a motion seeking a preliminary injunction.

The motion, filed Monday in U.S. District Court in Atlanta, seeks to prevent the Cobb Board of Elections from setting up 2024 elections with maps passed by the Georgia legislature in 2022 and asks for a ruling by December.

Four of the seven posts on the Cobb school board will be on the 2024 ballot, including Post 5 in East Cobb.

Attorneys from the Southern Poverty Law Center and other organizations claim those maps violate the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, and want them thrown out and redrawn before 2024 primaries in May.

The plaintiffs have claimed in their lawsuit, filed last year, that the three school board posts in South Cobb presently held by Democrats have been racially gerrymandered to dilute black and Hispanic voting strength.

They include Post 6, which previously included the Walton and Wheeler clusters and which are now in Post 5.

Republicans hold a 4-3 majority on the board, and three GOP-held seats will be up for re-election next year.

In their motion (you can read it here), the plaintiffs allege that the maps passed by the legislature placed a majority of black and Hispanic voters in the three southern posts and “bleaches the population of the northern districts,” in which the white populations of three of them were increased.

The motion says that the white population shift was most crucial in Post 7 in West Cobb, where incumbent Republican member Brad Wheeler narrowly won re-election in 2020 over a black Democrat. (see chart below).

The white population in Post 7 at the time was 47.55 percent. The maps passed last year increased the white population to 58.17 percent. Wheeler’s seat is among those set to expire in 2024.

The two posts in East Cobb have the highest percentage of white populations. While Post 5 didn’t change much (going from 66.97 percent to 67.24 percent), the Post 4 difference also was noticeable, rising from 57.24 percent white to 65.56.

David Chastain, one of the four GOP members of the school board, was re-elected to a third term in Post 4 last year.

The plaintiffs’ motion for an injunction comes as the Cobb elections board agreed to begin settlement talks. Ben Mathis, the lead attorney for the Cobb County School District, which had been released from the case, issued a charged statement last week accusing the elections board of “a total surrender” to what he called “leftist political activists” who wanted to usurp the power of the legislature to redraw the Cobb school board maps.

While Democrats control the Cobb Board of Commissioners and the county’s legislative delegation, Republicans currently control only the Cobb school board.

“After they discovered they could not change the direction of education in our county at the ballot box, they manufactured this unlawful court case,” Mathis said, referencing the plaintiffs.

Last week, the district’s attorneys filed a motion in federal court seeking a preliminary injunction to file an amicus brief and introduce rebuttal experts it says are necessary to respond to plaintiffs’ experts on racial discrimination in electoral maps who otherwise would have no opposition in court.

East Cobb News has left a message with the Cobb school district seeking comment on the motion for a preliminary injunction by the plaintiffs.

The school board majority hired Taylor English Decisions, a lobbying component of Cumberland-area law firm, Taylor English Duma LLP, to redraw the maps in 2021.

The Democratic-led Cobb delegation opted for maps that would keep the boundaries relatively unchanged.  Republican State Rep. Ginny Ehrhart of West Cobb—whose husband, former legislator Earl Ehrhart, was CEO of Taylor English Decisions at the time—sponsored maps redrawn by the school board’s law firm.

Those maps were approved in the GOP-dominated legislature, while the Cobb delegation’s maps did not receive a vote. Earl Ehrhart is now managing director of Freeman Mathis Decisions, the lobbying arm of Freeman Mathis & Gary, which the board hired this year to fight the redistricting suit.

The plaintiffs’ motion concludes by asking their motion be granted by Dec. 15  “so that an interim remedial map be adopted by January 22, 2024, well in advance of the 2024 elections to avoid hardship to Cobb County’s election administration and to mitigate voter confusion.”

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Cobb school district objects to redistricting suit settlement

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Cobb school district objects to redistricting suit settlement
Ben Mathis

The Cobb County School District issued a strongly-worded public statement Tuesday accusing the the Cobb Board of Elections of colluding with plaintiffs who are seeking new electoral maps for the Cobb Board of Education.

The elections board voted last week along partisan lines to begin settling with parties who filed a suit contending that the school board maps passed by the Georgia legislature in 2022 violated federal voting rights laws and diluted minority voting power.

Those claims were dismissed by a federal judge in Atlanta in July, and she released the Cobb school district as a defendant, leaving only the Cobb Elections Board to defend the lawsuit.

The plaintiffs, who are represented by attorneys from the Southern Poverty Law Center, a liberal advocacy group, are attempting to have either the Georgia legislature or a court redraw the maps.

In messages posted to the Cobb school district website (you can read them here and here) and released to the media, Ben Mathis, an attorney for the district, said the district wants to rejoin the lawsuit after a “hasty settlement” with the Cobb elections board “which they worked out in secrecy with their politically allied plaintiffs, [and that] is designed to avoid any legal effort to defend the current map.

“This is not a settlement but a total surrender by the Elections Board,” Mathis said. “This agreement is a complete usurpation of the legislative process.”

The seven-member Cobb school board has a 4-3 Republican majority. The seats of three of those Republicans, including David Banks of Post 5 in East Cobb, will be the 2024 ballot.

Democrats control the Cobb Board of Commissioners and the Cobb legislative delegation, and in his statement, Mathis accused the SPLC of trying “to impose their will over the Legislature, the Governor, and the voters of Cobb County.

“After they discovered they could not change the direction of education in our county at the ballot box, they manufactured this unlawful court case,” Mathis continued.

Cobb elections board chairwoman Tori Silas
Cobb elections board chairwoman Tori Silas

“To justify what they have done, the Elections Board says it is cheaper to give up than to defend the map against the array of liberal activist groups affiliated with Stacy Abrams and the Democratic Party.”

The Cobb elections board has four Democrats and one Republican, and voted 4-1, with GOP member Debbie Fisher opposed, to begin settlement discussions.

The vote came after a lengthy executive session and there was no discussion by elections board members in open session.

Daniel White, the attorney for the Cobb Elections Board, refuted the collusion claim, and a Cobb government spokesman issued a statement Tuesday from Tori Silas, the board chairwoman, saying her body is “not the proper party to defend the challenged redistricting maps.

“As the only remaining defendant in the case after the School District was given the dismissal it sought, we were left to make the decision that best served the citizens of Cobb County, which is what we did. The settlement allowed our Board to maintain its position of neutrality in this political dispute and was the fiscally responsible thing to do.”

In September federal judge Eleanor Ross issued an oral order precluding the Cobb school district from continuing as an intervenor in the lawsuit.

In a motion filed Tuesday, the district asked for a preliminary injunction to file an amicus brief and introduce rebuttal experts it says are necessary to respond to plaintiffs’ experts on racial discrimination in electoral maps who otherwise would have no opposition in court.

“Plaintiffs must be held to their strict burden of proof, especially when asking the Court to invade the state legislative process,” the Cobb school district lawyers said in their motion Tuesday.

East Cobb News contacted the SPLC, asking why it sued the Cobb Elections Board over a map drawn by the legislature. This is all that we received from its communications department:

“Voting rights are nonpartisan and rooted in the belief that equal opportunities to vote must be available to all people, regardless of their political affiliations, racial, cultural, or religious background. It is fundamental that every voice is heard and that elections are conducted fairly, and that is what Plaintiffs have consistently sought in this case. Plaintiffs look forward to proving their claims to the Court, as the terms of the settlement require before any changes are made to the map.”

The maps were originally drawn by Mathis’ firm, Freeman Mathis and Gary of Cumberland, and were approved by the school board’s Republican majority.

Among the changes in the map was moving Post 6 (formerly the Walton and Wheeler clusters) entirely into the Cumberland-Vinings-Smyrna area, and leaving East Cobb with only two school board seats, Post 4 and Post 5.

The Democratic-led Cobb legislative delegation proposed maps that wouldn’t have shifted the lines as dramatically, but they were never voted on by the Republican-dominated legislature.

The SPLC and other legal groups, including the ACLU of Georgia, filed its lawsuit, Finn v. Cobb County Board of Elections and Registration, last summer.

The plaintiffs include parents and liberal activists and organizations, including the League of Women Voters of Marietta-Cobb.

The lawsuit seeks substantial redrawing of posts 2,3 and 6 in South Cobb, all of which are currently held by Democrats.

White said in response to the Cobb school district’s claims that “the Cobb County School District made a massive blunder in its litigation strategy that cost it the ability to defend the redistricting maps it created. Rather than owning up to its mistake, counsel for the School District has chosen to deflect attention by making outlandish accusations about the Cobb County Board of Elections that it knows to be false.”

White, whose comments were initially published Friday by The Marietta Daily Journal, said the Cobb Elections Board from the outset had sought to dismiss the suit “on jurisdictional grounds” and that his clients could have been held liable if the plaintiffs proved that the Cobb school board “adopted racially gerrymandered maps.

“The Board of Elections agrees that the District should have been allowed to continue its defense of its maps, and moved the Court to let them back in the case. Now that the Court has made it clear the District will not be given that opportunity, the Board of Elections made the decision it felt was in the best interest of the citizens of Cobb County.”

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New Cobb Elections director hired; will start in December

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The Cobb Board of Elections and Registration on Monday voted to hire a new elections director.New Cobb Elections director hired

Her name is Tate Fall, and for the last year she has been the deputy elections director in Arlington County, Va.

A release issued Tuesday by Cobb County Government said that she will start Dec. 4, after municipal elections in several Cobb cities.

Fall will succeed Janine Eveler, who retired in April after serving in the role for 12 years.

Since July, the Cobb Elections office has been led on an interim basis by Gerry Miller, an assistant Cobb elections director in 2021 who also had retired from the department.

The search was extended because a lack of qualified candidates in the initial search.

In Tuesday’s release, Cobb Elections Board chairwoman Tori Silas said that “it was difficult to find someone with the level of experience needed along with the zeal for this job. We believe we have found the right person at the right time.”

Fall is a graduate of Auburn University and holds a master’s degree in public administration and a graduate certificate in election administration.

She also has worked for the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, an independent agency of the U.S. government. According to its website, its “mission is to help election officials improve the administration of elections and help Americans participate in the voting process.”

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Former Cobb Superior Court Clerk candidate seeking same office

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Nick Simpson, who ran for Cobb Superior Court Clerk in 2020, is seeking the same office in 2024 under very different circumstances.Former Cobb Superior Court Clerk candidate running again

A Democrat who lives in Acworth, Simpson said he is running for the seat held by Democratic incumbent Connie Taylor and is holding listening sessions.

He said in a release Tuesday that he’s doing this in part “to discuss the need for transparency and accountability in light of current fiscal practices at the clerk’s office that have been highlighted in recent news reports.”

(Here’s his campaign website.)

Taylor has come under fire for personally pocketing more than $400,000 in passport fees—which are legal—but far beyond her salary of $170,000.

A former whistleblower in her office has accused Taylor—who last year agreed to refund some of the extra money—of ordering her to destroy records about passport application fees.

In addition to maintaining court records and providing passport services, the Superior Court Clerk also is the custodian of real estate records and is one of four county elected officials whose position is created by the Georgia Constitution.

Simpson, who graduated from North Cobb High School and attended Powers Ferry Elementary School and Daniell Middle School, is a former chief operating officer of the Cobb Superior Court Clerk’s office.

In his release Tuesday, Simpson said he “seeks to prepare the Clerk’s office to meet the demands of the future by addressing technological needs caused by the proliferation of cyber and property fraud, and the county’s strong population growth and real estate market.”

In 2020, he finished third in the Democratic primary and endorsed Taylor in the runoff.

In announcing his 2024 campaign, Simpson said he supports the clerk having to transfer all fees from processing passport applications to the county treasury.

His other priorities include installing a in-house property fraud detection system to “detect incidents of fraud in real-time and not after a phony document has been sent to an outside party for review.”

Simpson was a coordinator for a family law information center in Fulton Superior Court and held government positions in New York before returning to Cobb.

He earned a bachelor’s degree from Howard University and a master’s degree in public administration from Columbia University.

Simpson also founded a consultancy to advise clients on implementing secure document control systems and procedures.

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Marietta to hold public hearings on proposed city ward map

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Proposed Marietta ward map public hearing
To see a larger version, click here.

Since a sliver of our coverage area includes easternmost portions of the City of Marietta, here’s a public notice about upcoming hearings on new city council and school board boundaries, with the first coming on Wednesday:

“The City of Marietta has proposed a new ward political boundary map that will determine which ward the citizens of Marietta will cast their vote in future elections. The proposed map is titled “Proposed Wards School and Parks Draft Option 2”. All concerned citizens are invited to attend the two public hearings on this redistricting map which will be held at Marietta City Hall, 205 Lawrence Street in the Council Chamber on Wednesday, September 13, 2023, at 7:00 P.M. and Wednesday, October 11, 2023, at 7:00 P.M. According to Federal law, the City of Marietta is required to redraw the ward boundaries to accommodate for the shifting change in population every ten years as determined by the U.S. Decennial Census.”

Those two hearings will take place during regularly scheduled city council meetings.

A couple of notes: We’ve been reporting on redistricting feuds over Cobb county commission and school board seats. The former involves a home rule claim over maps reapportioned by the county, and the latter is in federal court over voting-rights issues.

In Georgia, municipalities draw their own electoral maps after a new Census is released. A special committee of city council and school board members has been meeting to propose the map boundaries (see larger version of above map here).

Below is the current map (larger version).

As of July 2022 (Census overview here), Marietta has an estimated population of around 62,000, with each of the seven wards on the city council and school board including around 8,700 people.

The eastern part of the city includes all of wards 6 and 7 and a portion of ward 3.

Marietta’s next elections are scheduled for 2025. All of Cobb’s other six cities, including newly incorporated Mableton, will have non-partisan city council elections on Nov. 7.

Marietta City ward map 2013

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Richardson to hold kickoff event for Congressional campaign

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Cobb commissioner Jerica Richardson has launched a website and filed initial paperwork to run for the 6th District Congressional seat that includes some of East Cobb.Richardson Congressional campaign kickoff event

The first-term Democrat, whose tenure on the board is the subject of an ongoing legal dispute over redistricting, is holding a kickoff event for her Congressional bid next week.

On Thursday she announced on her campaign’s social media outlets to “join us for our big announcement in 6 DAYS!”

She’s accepting donations on Jerica for Congress website, as well as RSVPs for a kickoff event next Thursday at the Avalon mixed-use development in Alpharetta.

That’s currently within the boundaries of the new 6th Congressional District, which was redrawn by the Republican-dominated Georgia legislature after Democrat Lucy McBath won the seat in 2018.

Those boundaries included East Cobb, North Fulton, Sandy Springs and some of Buckhead.

Last year McBath, a black Democrat, won the 7th Congressional District seat based largely in Gwinnett.

But a federal lawsuit has been filed challenging the Georgia U.S. House maps, contending that they were drawn to dilute minority voting strength.

Richardson resides in the new 6th District, but reapportionment drew her out of her East Cobb home in District 2. Her term expires at the end of next year.

Her Congressional campaign website doesn’t include priorities or other specifics other than some basic biographical information.

“Jerica’s success lies in recognizing that what connects us is far greater than what separates us,” the website states. “Solving problems through collaboration and empowering others is a way of life for Jerica and she wants to put that to work for the citizens of Georgia’s 6th Congressional District.”

She and the board’s other two Democrats approved maps last fall that would have kept her in her commission seat. A lawsuit was filed by Republican commissioner Keli Gambrill to challenge Cobb’s decision to invoke home rule, arguing that only the legislature can conduct reapportionment.

Gambrill was denied standing in the suit in Cobb Superior Court but a hearing on its merits is scheduled for November.

Richardson Congressional campaign kickoff
Congressional maps showing metro Atlanta seats. Source: Georgia Legislative and Congressional Reapportionment Office

The new 6th District includes some of East Cobb, North Fulton and Sandy Springs, and Republican strongholds in Forsyth in Dawson counties were added.

That seat was won last November by Republican Rich McCormick, who got 62 percent of the vote in the general election over Democrat Bob Christian, who has filed to run again in 2024.

But the plaintiffs in the lawsuit are seeking another majority-black Congressional district to be created in metro Atlanta under provisions of the federal Voting Rights Act.

A trial began this week in U.S. District Court in Atlanta, following a ruling last week that struck down a Republican-majority Congressional maps in Alabama for similar reasons. The state has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Richardson was elected in 2020 in her first campaign for public office to succeed three-term Republican commissioner Bob Ott.

According to Federal Election Commission reports, Richardson filed her campaign paperwork on Aug. 16.

In addition to Christian and Richardson, another Democrat has filed to run. Shelly Abraham of Duluth, a mechanical consulting engineer, is a first-time candidate for public office.

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Cobb commissioner dropped as plaintiff in redistricting suits

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A Cobb Superior Court judge ruled Wednesday that Cobb Commissioner Keli Gambrill doesn’t have standing in lawsuits she filed to contest the county’s invocation of home rule over redistricting.Cobb commissioner dropped from redistricting lawsuit

Judge Ann Harris said that Gambrill, a Republican who represents District 1 in Northwest Cobb, failed to show specific harm done to her when the commission’s three Democrats last fall voted to implement commission maps they preferred over those adopted last year by the Georgia legislature.

In court filings, Gambrill—who said she was acting as a private citizen in the lawsuits—said the uncertainty over the maps may affect if she’s re-elected and where she would be voting.

But Harris noted that Gambrill was re-elected last year after being unopposed and that her district lines changed little.

“At best, the concerns raised by Gambrill are generalized and according to her, shared by all citizens,” Harris wrote. “They are not particular to Gambrill, and therefore, they are not sufficient to show an injury in fact to Gambrill. Several of her claims arise from her official capacity and are not relevant to this suit. As a result, Plaintiff Gambrill has no standing to proceed on these claims and her case ends here.”

(You can read the ruling by clicking here.)

Harris said the other plaintiffs, Catherine and David Floam, can remain, since they are residents of District 3 in East Cobb that is at the heart of the map dispute.

Proposed Cobb commission redistricting map
Maps approved by the Cobb commission’s Democrats would keep Jerica Richardson of East Cobb in the District 2 (in pink) that she currently represents.

They had been in District 1 and voted there in 2022, but the Democratic maps that are being recognized by the county placed them in District 3.

The Democratic maps dramatically altered the two districts in East Cobb. Jerica Richardson of District 2 was drawn out of her home by the legislative maps, which put most of East Cobb in District 3, represented by Republican JoAnn Birrell.

Birrell was re-elected under the legislative maps last year but did not get involved in the lawsuits. She attended a July 7 hearing in Harris’ chamber on the issue of standing.

Attorney General Chris Carr, while issuing an opinion this spring that the Cobb Democratic maps are not legal, said his office cannot get involved until there is a legal action.

The county filed for home rule to keep Richardson, a first-term Democrat, in office. Her term ends in 2024, and she has repeatedly claimed that drawing her out of her district during her term has been unprecedented in Georgia.

She started a non-profit education organization, For Which It Stance, to advocate for local government control on a number of issues.

Gambrill and Birrell have said their Democratic colleagues’ action is unconstitutional because only the legislature can conduct reapportionment.

Cobb GOP BOC redistricting map
Cobb commission maps passed by the Georgia legislature would include most of East Cobb in District 3 (gold).

Gambrill also filed a suit to have the Democratic maps ruled unconstitutional and replaced with those adopted by the legislature. She initially filed the lawsuits in March with former Cobb Commission Chairman candidate Larry Savage of East Cobb, who later withdrew.

She spent her own money to hire Ray Smith, an Atlanta attorney, who argued on her and the Floams’ behalf at the July hearing before Harris.

On Tuesday, Smith was indicted by the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office, along with former President Donald Trump and 17 others accused of trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia.

Both of the redistricting lawsuits are before Harris, who has scheduled a Nov. 20 hearing on the county’s motion for judgment.

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Richardson advocacy group to hold redistricting event

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The group For Which It Stance, a non-profit started by Cobb District 2 commissioner Jerica Richardson, is holding a panel discussion event next week to discuss political redistricting.

Richardson advocacy group to hold redistricting event
Jerica Richardson

What’s billed as part of the “Sip n’ Save Democracy Series” takes place next Friday, Aug. 18, from 6-9 p.m., at the Grits & Eggs Breakfast Kitchen (3205 Cumberland Boulevard, Suite 105).

The guest speakers include Aunna Dennis of Common Cause Georgia, Ken Lawler of Fair Districts GA, Nichola Hines of the League of Women Voters of Georgia and Kimberlyn Carter of Represent Georgia, a progressive political leadership organization and Peach Power PAC, which endorses Georgia Democratic candidates.

“Our knowledgeable speakers will provide top-shelf insight into recent redistricting cases and what they see coming ahead of the next election cycle,” the For Which It Stance event item states.

Richardson, a first-term Democrat, and the two other Democrats on the Cobb Board of Commissioners are contesting redistricting maps passed last year by the Georgia legislature that drew Richardson out of her East Cobb home.

In challenging the maps, Richardson said she was responding to an unprecedented legislative action, as the Republican-dominated General Assembly did not vote on maps approved by Cobb’s Democratic-majority delegation.

East Cobb resident Debbie Fisher filed an ethics complaint against Richardson earlier this year, saying she was engaging in a conflict of interest via For Which It Stance, which seeks to “educate, engage and empower” citizens about issues relating to local control.

Another page on that site, entitled “Drawn Out GA,” includes suggestions for fundraising amounts, which Fisher claimed constituted an ethics violation.

But the Cobb Board of Ethics dismissed the complaint in March. Fisher was later appointed to the Cobb Board of Elections by the Cobb Republican Party.

A hearing on the county’s attempt to invoke home rule was held last month in Cobb Superior Court. Republican commissioner Keli Gambrill has filed a suit against that provision, saying only the legislature can conduct reapportionment.

Another court hearing for her motion to be granted standing is scheduled for Aug. 30.

Richardson’s term expires at the end of 2024.

For more information on next week’s redistricting event, including registration, click here.

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Conservative group opposed to Cobb transit tax referendum

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A Cobb County political organization with ties to the Tea Party is urging the Cobb Board of Commissioners to vote against holding a transit tax referendum in 2024.Franklin Roundtable, Conversative group opposed to Cobb transit tax referendum

The Franklin Roundtable, which labels itself “a non-partisan advocacy group based in Marietta,” said its board of directors has voted unanimously to oppose the proposed tax.

Cobb commissioners are expected to decide later this whether to call for a transit tax referendum after voting along party-lines in March to hire a consultant to plan for such a referendum.

Jim Jess, chairman of Franklin Roundtable, said in release that “the transit tax is nothing but a boondoggle. We need serious traffic solutions. But what do we get from our commissioners? Empty buses on Cobb County streets. Multimillion dollar transportation studies that make consultants rich. And transit proposals that won’t improve traffic flow. Who is being served by this? It’s certainly not the citizens of Cobb County.”

The three Democrats on the board voted to hire the consultant, Kimley-Horn & Associates, to prepare for what’s being called the Cobb Mobility SPLOST.

It’s a one-percent, special-purpose local-option sales tax that Democratic Chairwoman Lisa Cupid has proposed to be collected for 30 years for a variety of transportation purposes, including mass transit as well as traditional transportation options, including resurfacing.

The two Republicans voted against hiring the consultant, and have said they’re opposed to such a long tax-collection period.

GOP commissioner JoAnn Birrell of East Cobb has publicly supported a five-year tax for road transportation projects.

The Franklin Roundtable, named after Benjamin Franklin, is a non-profit that supports limited government, free markets and fiscal responsibility. Its website states that since 2018, it has been the “official public name” of the Georgia Tea Party Inc.

“Most of our current commissioners are not serious about real traffic solutions, and they are not fiscally responsible,” Jess said. “They are more concerned about serving the economic development lobby and the consultant lobby. County spending reflects this year after year.”

Much of the group’s statement focused on mass transit, which it called “an idea best left in the previous century.”

Instead, the Franklin Roundtable suggested in one example that the county contract with Uber or Lyft to help those needing transportation to work.

The group also suggested building flyover lanes or access roads to bypass busy intersections, and the purchase of vans that are “smaller and can move through traffic more quickly” than more expensive buses.

Jess said that “solutions like the ones we are talking about are simply common sense. We need our commissioners to make some better decisions, beginning with dropping the idea of a transit tax. It really doesn’t make sense for our situation in Cobb County.”

The Franklin Roundtable release said that should there be a referendum, it will work with “a coalition of likeminded citizens and organizations to defeat this wasteful, ineffective and unnecessary tax.”

Cobb DOT officials told commissioners in March that part of the consultant’s work was to conduct further outreach, following an objection to a 30-year tax from the mayor of Cobb’s cities.

Cobb DOT has not yet released a detailed project list of what might be used with tax revenues.

Department head Drew Raessler said this spring more input is being is being sought from citizens and in cities and community improvement projects to hear “what type of projects they would like to see.”

He has said that more transit solutions need to be provided to Cobb citizens so the county can continue to grow economically.

Cupid said at the same March meeting to hire the consultant that “I think we have a significant opportunity to invest in our future, at least just to ask the citizens the questions, to flesh out with the mayors what the options are.”

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Cristadoro campaign gets new endorsements from Cobb leaders

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Cristadoro campaign gets new endorsements from Cobb leaders
Jay Cunningham

Cobb Board of Education candidate John Cristadoro said Friday that a number of prominent business, community, educational and political leaders have endorsed his campaign for the East Cobb-based Post 5 seat.

They include former Cobb commissioner and Georgia Public Service commissioner Stan Wise, Superior Plumbing CEO Jay Cunningham and former Cobb Republican Party chairs Scott Johnson and Rose Wing.

Cristadoro is a Republican with two children in the Walton attendance zone who is seeking the seat currently held by GOP school board vice chairman David Banks, who has not said said if he will be seeking a fifth term next year.

The Post 5 seat includes the Walton, Wheeler and Pope attendance zones. Democrat Laura Judge, also a parent in the Walton zone, has announced her candidacy.

Cristadoro is a first-time candidate but has compiled a lengthy list of influential supporters he’s calling his “campaign leadership team.”

They include John Loud, CEO of Loud Security Systems and a former chairman of the Cobb Chamber of Commerce and Scott Sweeney, a former school board member from East Cobb who’s the current chairman of the Georgia Board of Education.

Cunningham is one of four current members of the Cobb County School District’s Finance and Technology Committee that conducts oversight of the education SPLOST to endorse Cristadoro.

The others are Shane Spink, a community leader in the Sprayberry High School area and Wayne Brown, an engineer, both appointed by Post 4 Republican school board member David Chastain.

Lesley Litt, business executive, was appointed by Republican Brad Wheeler and Cunningham by Republican Randy Scamihorn.

The seats held by Banks, Wheeler, Scamihorn and Democrat Tre’ Hutchins will be up for election in 2024.

As East Cobb News first reported earlier this month, Cristadoro has raised nearly $30,000—loaning his campaign $10,000—for what’s expected to be an expensive campaign. Judge has raised nearly $9,000.

In his release Friday, Cristadoro said of his new supporters that “I am very honored these known leaders have chosen to join our campaign team. They will be very beneficial in assisting our campaign goal to keep the Cobb County School District strong and a recognized leader in academics.”

  • Stan Wise—Former Ga. Public Commissioner, Cobb County Commissioner
  • Jay Cunningham—CEO of Superior Plumbing, CCSD F & T Committee
  • Scott Johnson—Served on Georgia Board of Education; previous Chairman of Cobb GOP
  • Shane Spink—F & T Committee Member for CCSD and businessman
  • Alice Stouder—Former Cobb school district assistant superintendent
  • Wayne Brown—Member of CCSD F & T Committee
  • Lawson Kirkland—Senior V.P. in the banking industry
  • Peter Heinzleman—Former CEO of Cobb EMC and current business owner
  • Lesley Litt—Immediate Past Chair of CCSD F & T Committee and CEO of CrystalFlex
  • Hilda Wilkins—Retired Cobb school principal and Director of Accreditation for Cobb Schools
  • Dan Joy—Principal with Rule Joy Tramell & Rule Architecture Design
  • Dan Payrow—President of R.S. Andrews
  • Rose Wing—Attorney and former Cobb assistant district attorney and previous Cobb GOP Chair
  • Tracy Cullo—Chair of East Cobb Republican Women’s Club
  • Simone Thomas—East Cobb Community resident and community activist
  • Irey Sanders—Regional V.P of Brasfield & Gorrie
  • Pam & Tom Reardon—Cobb Republican activists
  • Bob Kilinski—Regional Operating Partner Keller Williams International
  • Jeff Chassner—Chief Sales Officer at New Realm
  • Lewis Lampley—Senior Clinical Research at Boston Scientific
  • Stephanie Joseph—East Cobb Resident and community activist.
  • Ryan Casey—Owner of Paper Connexion
  • Michael Trent—CEO of Trent Consulting and youth baseball coach

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Federal judge sides with Cobb schools in redistricting suit

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A federal judge has said a group of plaintiffs suing over redistricting of Cobb Board of Education seats doesn’t have a legal claim against the Cobb County School District.

Cobb school board redistricting town hall
Cobb Board of Education maps passed by the legislature were first recommended by the school board’s Republican majority.

That doesn’t end the lawsuit, filed on behalf of several plaintiffs by the Southern Poverty Law Center, the ACLU and other attorneys.

Judge Eleanor Ross also ruled against the Cobb Board of Elections and Registration, the defendant, to have the suit dismissed entirely.

Plaintiffs claimed that the Georgia legislature, which passed the new maps last year, violated the U.S. Voting Rights Act and used race as a guiding factor in redrawing the seven school board posts.

Those actions included Post 2 and 3 in South Cobb and Post 6, which had covered most of the Walton and Wheeler high school attendance zones, and which was moved out of East Cobb, and mostly into the Cumberland-Smyrna-Vinings area.

Among the claims made by the plaintiffs was that the Cobb Board of Education’s four-member white Republican majority “voted on racial lines and without substantive debate to hire—at great expense to the county—a consulting firm to draw a proposed map” and that the process “both the hiring of a third party to draw the redistricting maps and the Board’s decision to forego bids from multiple firms— strayed from the Board’s past practices.”

That map was adopted by the legislature and was signed into law by Gov. Brian Kemp and went into effect for the 2022 elections.

The lawsuit seeks to declare the drawing of posts 2, 3 and 6 unconstitutional based and to order the legislature to draw a new map.

But in a ruling issued Tuesday, Ross, of the U.S. District Court in Atlanta said that “the Court finds that the above allegations are insufficient to establish a ‘longstanding and widespread practice’ by the District of recommending a racially gerrymandered map for the Board of Education elections in Cobb County.”

Ross, an appointee of former President Barack Obama, issued the ruling nearly a month after a hearing in her courtroom.

You can read the ruling by clicking here.

The Cobb school district hired an outside law firm as it sought a judgment that it shouldn’t be held liable for a redistricting map approved by the state legislature.

In a release issued late Thursday afternoon, the Cobb school district said the following:

“The suit is an unfortunate extension of efforts by political activists and organizations to exert influence in Cobb County’s schools. . . .

“While the Court’s opinion frees the District and its Board members from baseless accusations of racial discrimination, the District continues to be concerned that Cobb County Board of Elections, a politically appointed body, chose not to join the District in asking Judge Ross to rule in its favor and conclude the lawsuit.”

The SPLC issued the following statement from Poy Winichakul, one of its attorneys for voting rights:

“Despite the district’s mischaracterizations of the court’s order and the case itself, we are pleased that the plaintiffs’ case against the Board of Elections is moving forward. Judge Ross declined to rule on any of the district’s arguments related to the map. What this means is that our case is proceeding exactly as plaintiffs originally pled it last summer and the district will no longer spend the county’s resources litigating the case, but instead will return to its important job of educating the students of Cobb County. We look forward to proving our case on the merits.”

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Cobb school board member fined for campaign finance violations

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David Chastain, Cobb school board candidate

David Chastain, a third-term member of the Cobb Board of Education, has been fined $250 and ordered to pay back a portion of two campaign contributions from last year that were deemed to be a violation of state campaign finance limits.

The Georgia Government Transparency and Campaign Finance Commission ruled last month that two donations Chastain’s campaign received exceeded state limits and that his campaign didn’t file the proper paperwork to separate them between the primary and general election.

A Republican, Chastain was re-elected last year to serve Post 4, which includes the Kell and Sprayberry high school clusters, after a bitter general election campaign against Democrat Catherine Pozniak.

Neither of them had a primary opponent last March. Pozniak, a Sprayberry High School graduate who took an early fundraising lead over Chastain, accused him of violating state laws limiting the amounts of individual contributors three weeks before the general electdion.

One of them was a total of $5,000 from State Rep. Ginny Erhart, a West Cobb Republican who filed reapportionment maps for the Cobb school board and Cobb Board of Commissioners that were passed by the legislature.

Another was $4,000 from Jonathan Crumly, an attorney with Taylor English Duma who drew the school board maps. Erhart’s husband, former State Rep. Earl Erhart, was the CEO of Taylor English Decisions LLC, the lobbying arm of the law firm, last year.

The individual limit under Georgia campaign finance law is $3,000, and Chastain later filed amended reports that split the contributions in two.

He said his campaign mistakenly forgot to separate the contributions from Ginny Erhart and Crumly. But the state campaign finance commission, in a June 26 consent order, concluded that Chastain didn’t file the necessary paperwork to bundle the donations.

In addition to the $250 civil penalty, Chastain was ordered to repay Erhart $1,500 and Crumly $1,000, which Chastain included in a revised campaign finance report filed July 7.

At the time, Chastain said Pozniak’s complaint was “baseless and politics at its worst,” and showed “a deliberate attempt by Catherine Pozniak and her small platoon of Democratic socialists [that] is on full display by Cobb County.”

A few days after the Pozniak complaint was filed, Ginny Erhart issued a press release claiming Pozniak fraudulently filed a senior school tax exemption for her late father’s home.

Pozniak denied the charge and said that “for Mr. Chastain and his political cronies to retaliate with a smear campaign launched on a family tragedy is beyond reprehensible.”

Chastain defeated Pozniak with 54 percent of the vote as Republicans kept a 4-3 majority on the Cobb school board.

The school board map sponsored by Ginny Erhart is the subject of a federal lawsuit that the Cobb County School District has joined.

Earl Erhart is now the managing director of Freeman Mathis Decisions, the lobbying group for Freeman Matbis and Gary, which the Cobb school district has hired to represent it in the lawsuit.

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Interim Cobb elections director appointed as search continues

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The Cobb Board of Elections and Registration on Tuesday appointed Gerry Miller to run the department on an interim basis.

Interim Cobb Elections director appointedMiller retired as an assistant elections director in Cobb in 2021, and also was an elections supervisor in Fulton and Henry counties.

The Cobb Elections office has been without a director since Janine Eveler retired in April.

Miller was the department’s preparation center director for 11 years, and will serve in the interim capacity as the board conducts a national search for a permanent successor.

“We are grateful that Gerry has agreed to come out of retirement to help lead our elections team,” Cobb elections board chairwoman Tori Silas said in a statement issued Tuesday by Cobb County government.

“We believe he will provide steady leadership while we work to expand our search for a new Elections Director.”

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Cobb school board candidate reports nearly $30K in fundraising

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Cobb school board candidate reports nearly $30K in fundraising

Republican John Cristadoro, who is seeking the Post 5 seat on the Cobb Board of Education, has filed a financial disclosure report showing nearly $30,000 in contributions.

That’s nearly a year before the 2024 primaries in what’s expected to be an expensive race.

According to a report filed with the Cobb Board of Elections and Registration, Cristadoro received $18,337 in contributions from a variety of individuals and entities through June 30.

He also loaned himself $10,000 for a total of $28,337 in contributions, according to the report (you can read it here).

He is one of two announced candidates for the Post 5 seat, which is held by Republican David Banks, and which includes the Walton, Wheeler and Pope High School clusters.

The other is Democrat Laura Judge, who filed a report showing $9,255 in contributions, also through June 30 (you can read it here).

Candidates are required to file financial disclosure reports at the end of June and at the end of December for each year in an election cycle.

Primaries will be held in Georgia for federal, state and local candidates on May 21, 2024; the Georgia presidential primary is March 12, 2024.

According to Cristadoro’s report, he has several contributors who’s given at least $1,000 or more.

They include former Cobb Chamber of Commerce chairman John Loud, who’s heading Cristadoro’s steering committee.

Other $1,000+ contributors include Pamela Reardon, an East Cobb real estate agent who’s active with the Cobb Republican Party, and East Cobb resident Caryn Sonderman.

She’s an East Cobb parent who frequently speaks at Cobb school board public comment sessions and who according to the disclosure report was the host of a Cristadoro fundraiser.

Attorney Mary Anne Ackourey contributed $1,546 to the Cristadoro campaign. She’s with Freeman Mathis & Gary, a law firm with offices in the Cumberland area that’s representing the Cobb County School District in a current federal lawsuit over school board redistricting.

Judge is a member of Watching the Funds—Cobb, a citizens group that scrutinizes Cobb school district finances. Fellow WTF-Cobb members Heather Tolley-Bauer and Stacy Efrat have contributed $500 and $250, respectively.

Several state lawmakers have contributed to the Judge campaign: Democratic State Sen. Jason Esteves, whose 6th District includes part of East Cobb, contributed $250.

Democratic Rep. Lisa Campbell of North Cobb contributed $500 and Democratic Sen. Josh McLaurin of North Fulton contributed $100.

Banks, a four-term Republican, has not filed a recent disclosure reports. He told East Cobb News this spring that he has not decided if he’ll seeking re-election.

In an interview with East Cobb News in April, Cristadoro estimated he would need to raise around $85,000 for his campaign.

The Post 5 race is one of four campaigns on the Cobb school board in 2024, and party control of the board is at stake. Republicans have a 4-3 majority, but three current GOP seats will be on the ballot.

The others are held by Brad Wheeler and Randy Scamihorn, neither of whom has filed a recent disclosure report.

First-term Democrat Tre’ Hutchins of South Cobb has filed a disclosure report for the first half of 2023.

You can read through other campaign reports by clicking here.

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East Cobb residents appointed to Cobb Board of Elections

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East Cobb residents appointed to Cobb Board of Elections
Stacy Efrat, left, and Debbie Fisher are sworn in by Cobb Probate Court Chief Judge Kelli L. Wolk. Photo: Cobb County government

Two East Cobb residents were recently appointed to the Cobb Board of Elections.

Stacy Butler Efrat was appointed by the Cobb Democratic Party, and Debbie Fisher was chosen by the Cobb Republican Party.

They were sworn in last week and began four-year terms on July 1.

Both are citizen-activists who have been involved in party politics at the local level.

Efrat is a member of Watching The Funds-Cobb, a watchdog group that monitors finances and spending by the Cobb County School District (see our profile story from 2021).

The group has been critical of Cobb school district purchases of COVID-19 sanitizing lights and handwashing machines that were the focus of a Cobb grand jury report, as well the district’s alert system vendor that changed last year after malfunctions.

Efrat has been active in canvassing for Democratic candidates in an East Cobb community that has been traditionally Republican. But in recent election cycles, Democratic candidates have been either winning or become more competitive.

Efrat is a risk manager in the financial industry and is a parent in the Walton High School cluster.Last year, she protested a new logo for East Side Elementary School, saying it resembled the Nazi eagle crest.

Fisher, retired from the internet security industry, is currently a vice president for party and grassroots development with the Cobb Republican Party.

In addition to those and other local GOP roles, she has been involved in civic affairs as a critic of Cobb County government spending and has spoken out against high-density zoning cases in East Cobb.

Earlier this year, she filed an ethics complaint against Cobb Commissioner Jerica Richardson over the latter’s political action committee activities.

But that complaint was dismissed by the Cobb Board of Ethics.

Fisher is the only appointee of Republican interests on the elections board. Jennifer Mosbacher, another East Cobb resident, is the appointee of Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid.

Chairwoman Tori Silas and Steven Bruning are appointees of the Cobb legislative delegation, which has a Democratic majority.

The first meeting for Efrat and Fisher is July 10.

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Cobb Chairwoman Cupid to kick off 2024 re-election campaign

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Cobb Commission Chairwoman Lisa Cupid will hold a fundraiser next week at the formal launch of her re-election campaign.Cupid re-election campaign kickoff fundraiser

The event takes place next Thursday, June 29, from 5-7 p.m. at 45 South Avenue in the city of Marietta, just below Roswell Street.

Cupid, a Democrat in her first term in the position, sent an official announcement to supporters on Thursday, and included a link for donations.

Cupid is the first woman and the first African-American to be the elected head of county government, as well as the first Democrat since Ernest Barrett in the 1980s.

She also is one of three members of the Cobb Board of Commissioners whose terms expire at the end of 2024. They include fellow Democrats Monique Sheffield of District 4 in South Cobb that Cupid represented for two terms, and the District 2 seat occupied by Jerica Richardson that is embroiled in a legal battle over reapportionment.

Cupid’s updated campaign website declares that she’s a “History Maker. Difference Maker.”

In her message to supporters, Cupid said Cobb has “accomplished a lot and overcome much by way of a pandemic, cityhood efforts and historic redistricting to limit all five of our commissioners from serving. Through all of this, Cobb remains a vibrant, economically strong county that continues to attract new residents, businesses, and energy.”

She noted that the county has maintained its triple AAA bond rating and has expanded partnerships to boost transit, provide housing assistance, and recover from the COVID pandemic.

“Moreover, we have increased in population and diversity with measures to strengthen policing in a way that builds trust. We are also modernizing our purchasing processes to make it easier for minority-, women-, and service-disabled veteran businesses to do business with the County.

Over the next four years, we have the opportunity to continue the important work of aligning our county with sound business practices in strategic management, sustainability, and workforce retention. We also look forward to finally letting citizens cast their vote on transit investment and expansion in 2024.”

Cupid’s first two-and-a-half years as chairwoman have come with some controversy, and the five-woman board has been divided along partisan lines on a number of issues.

Republican District 1 member Keli Gambrill has filed a lawsuit against the county over the Democrats’ vote to invoke home rule to keep Richardson in office [a hearing has been scheduled in Cobb Superior Court next month].

Gambrill and fellow GOP member JoAnn Birrell of District 3–whose East Cobb boundaries are also being contested in the legal dispute—have opposed the Democrats on the need for a county strategic plan, the length of the proposed transit tax, and some diversity issues.

At the first meeting of the year in January, they tried to protest the home rule vote by refusing to vote on routine county business, but Cupid said that violated board policy and she ordered them to leave the dais.

More recently, Cupid responded to citizens who have lashed out at her during public comment periods. At a recent Cobb Prayer Breakfast, Cupid referenced the Cobb school district and drew a sharp rebuke from Superintendent Chris Ragsdale.

Cupid—who has themed her agenda around the slogan “All in Cobb,”—didn’t specify in her supporters’ message details of her priorities in a second term.

“I am positive about where we are headed; however, I recognize we still have more work to do,” she said. “I look forward to making these strides with you.”

Cupid, who defeated then-incumbent Republican chairman Mike Boyce in 2020, is the only announced candidate thus far.

In 2024, most countywide offices will be on the ballot, including District Attorney and Sheriff.

Democrats hold all but one of them in a Cobb County that until recent years was dominated by GOP office-holders. Tax Commissioner Carla Jackson is the only Republican, and in 2020 had no Democratic opposition.

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U.S. Rep. McCormick endorses DeSantis in presidential race

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U.S. Rep. Rich McCormick, whose 6th District includes part of East Cobb, is one of a handful of members of Congress to support Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in his campaign for president.U.S. Rep. McCormick endorses DeSantis

DeSantis, who recently won re-election by nearly 20 points, announced his candidacy this week for the Republican nomination, and McCormick issued a video (see below) calling him “a bold conservative” who can not only defeat Democratic President Joe Biden, but “grow our party.”

In the two-minute video, McCormick—who is serving his first term in a district that also includes North Fulton and Forsyth and Dawson counties—didn’t reference former President Donald Trump, who’s holding big leads in polling among GOP candidates.

McCormick blamed what he called “Joe Biden’s failed leadership” on issues such as immigration, crime and energy.

“We need a warrior to do whatever it takes to champion conservative values and safeguard the next generation,” McCormick said in the video, adding that DeSantis is “battle-tested and ready to be our next president. He’s bold and has a vision for our future.”

In the Republican congressional primary last year, McCormick defeated Jake Evans, whom Trump had endorsed.

Among Trump’s Congressional endorsers is Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, whose district includes part of South Cobb.

GOP Congressman Barry Loudermilk, whose 11th District also includes part of East Cobb, has supported Trump in the past but thus far hasn’t announced his preference for 2024.

Georgia figures to be a battleground state again in the 2024 presidential election. Biden was declared the winner in 2020 by less than 12,000 votes, but Trump has disputed those results ever since.

The Fulton County District Attorney’s office has been investigating whether Trump and his campaign broke the law in trying to overturn the Georgia results, and there could be indictments.

The dispute has roiled Georgia Republicans, as Trump attacked Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, fellow Republicans who have upheld said the 2020 election results in the state.

Both are bypassing the state Republican Party convention next month in Columbus, but Trump has said he will attend.

McCormick also published an end0rsement of DeSantis in The Hill, a Washington political publication, saying the Florida governor, who has touted a strong conservative legislative agenda and whose pugnacious style includes an extended battle with the Walt Disney Co. on cultural issues, “will fight and will win.”

McCormick said DeSantis’ strengths include “stopping the left’s woke agenda, spurring economic growth, and keeping us safe.”

He also said it’s important to back a candidate “who can fight and win against the radical left and their allies in the media. Who can earn victory in Georgia. Who can beat Joe Biden.

“Most of all, this election is not about the past,” McCormick said, with the video showing DeSantis, 44, his wife and three young children. “It’s about the future. Who can lift us up, who can inspire the nation, who can lead us forward.”

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Cobb school board hires law firm in redistricting lawsuit

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The Cobb Board of Education on Thursday approved the hiring of a separate law firm for a federal lawsuit that challenges the reapportionment of Cobb Board of Education seats last year.

Cobb school board redistricting town hall
Cobb Board of Education maps that went into effect on Jan. 1 took Post 6 out of East Cobb. For a larger view click here.

After an executive session, the board voted to hire Galleria-based Freeman Mathis and Gary LLP, which filed a motion in late March seeking judgment, and earlier this month subpoenaed plaintiffs seeking documentation and records.

A June 22 hearing has been scheduled in the courtroom of U.S. District Court Judge Eleanor Ross in Atlanta over the district’s motion for judgment.

The district and board have been represented on most legal matters since 2022 by the Atlanta firm of Parker Poe Adams.

The board didn’t discuss the matter during Thursday’s meeting, including the cost for the legal services by Freeman Mathis and Gary. East Cobb News has left a message with the Cobb school district seeking more information.

The Cobb Board of Elections and Registration was sued last summer by several Cobb parents, who are being represented by the Southern Poverty Law Center, the ACLU Foundation of Georgia and other advocacy groups.

They claim that the Georgia legislature adopted Cobb school board maps that violated the U.S. Voting Rights Act and used race as a guiding factor in redrawing the seven posts.

Those actions included Post 2 and 3 in South Cobb and Post 6, which had covered most of the Walton and Wheeler high school attendance zones, and which was moved out of East Cobb, and mostly into the Cumberland-Smyrna-Vinings area.

Until last November’s elections, those three posts were represented by black school board members; the board’s current African-American members represent Post 3 and Post 6.

The plaintiffs filed an amended complaint last August (you can read it here) that alleges that the four-member Republican school board majority undertook a secretive process to have a map drawn that was then introduced by State Rep. Ginny Ehrhart, a West Cobb Republican.

The managing director of Freeman Mathis Decisions, the government relations arm of the law firm representing the Cobb school district, is her husband and predecessor, former State Rep. Earl Ehrhart.

He previously held a similar position at Taylor English Decisions, a lobbying component of Taylor English Duma LLP, a law firm that drew the Cobb school board maps recommended by the board Republicans.

The Ehrhart-sponsored maps were adopted by the legislature last year.

The Democratic-majority Cobb legislative delegation backed another map that would have made few changes to those lines, but it was never voted on in the legislature.

That latter event—ignoring local courtesies—is also at the heart of a separate redistricting lawsuit filed against the Cobb Board of Commissioners, whose Democratic majority voted last October to invoke home rule over reapportionament that drew District 2 commissioner Jerica Richardson out of her seat.

“Ultimately, the Board and General Assembly enacted a redistricting plan that whitewashed the northern, eastern, and western districts by packing Black and Latinx voters into the Challenged Districts, as a last-ditch effort to limit the power of their emerging political coalition,” the Cobb school plaintiffs’ amended lawsuit states.

The Cobb school district responded in March, accusing the plaintiffs of making “scurrilous accusations” about board members in what was a “purely political dispute” based on partisan differences.

They included school board actions over the district’s COVID-19 response as well as racial and equity issues—mentioning the banning of teaching critical race theory and the board majority’s refusal to consider renaming Wheeler High School, named after a Confederate Civil War general.

The plaintiffs represent organizations “that in reality promote partisan Democratic causes, and individuals they recruited who are also partisan Democrats, are upset that the effect of the redistricting process did not align with their preferred partisan outcome: a Democratic takeover of the Board of Education,” the Cobb school district motion states.

(You can read the school district’s motion here.)

The school district motion said that the Cobb school board, which isn’t named as a defendant in the lawsuit, can’t be held liable for a redistricting map approved by the state legislature.

The complaint against the new maps, the school district motion said, involves “run of the mill political disputes over which Republicans and Democrats clash every day.”

The plaintiffs’ attorneys were given until April 28 to produce documents and prepare for the June hearing for the Cobb school district’s motion.

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East Cobb activist declares intent to run for school board

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A political activist who lives in the Walton High School area has filed declaration of intent paperwork to run for a seat on the Cobb Board of Education in 2024.Laura Judge, Cobb school board candidate

Laura Tucker Judge filed the declaration with the Cobb Board of Elections and Registration on March 28 as a Democrat seeking the Post 5 seat.

That’s currently held by Republican four-term member David Banks, who told East Cobb News this week he’s undecided about seeking re-election.

East Cobb businessman and youth sports coach John Cristadoro announced his candidacy last week at the Cobb Republican Party breakfast, and he’s lined up a number of prominent civic and business leaders to support him.

Judge is a leader of Watching the Funds-Cobb, a citizen-based group that has been critical of Cobb County School District financial and spending priorities, and is the education chair for Cobb Commissioner Jerica Richardson’s District 2 citizens cabinet.

Judge also is the co-elections lead in Georgia for Moms Demand Action, which lobbies to prevent and reduce gun violence, and has spoken frequently at Cobb school board public comment periods, in particular about school safety.

She and her husband run a digital content marketing company and have two children.

In response to a message for comment from East Cobb News, Judge said she will be formally announcing her decision “in the next few weeks.”

“I have been clear previously as an engaged parent and community member that our school board should answer to us as the stakeholders,” Judge said. “Parents, students, and teachers deserve to be engaged with our school board and their voices should be heard.

“While our East Cobb schools are some of the best in not only the county, but the state and nation, community members still have questions regarding financial decisions, literacy concerns, school safety, and discipline issues. Our current board member has not answered those concerns of the community to my knowledge.”

A declaration of intent to run does not obligate a candidate to launch a formal campaign but is an initial step to set up campaign committees for fundraising and other exploratory purposes.

Cristadoro told East Cobb News earlier this week his campaign organization is finalizing paperwork for the same purpose, but as of Friday that had not been filed.

The 2024 primaries will be held next May.

Banks said he expects several other candidates to get in the race but didn’t elaborate on who they might be.

Post 5 was redrawn by the Georgia legislature last year to include the Walton, Wheeler and most of the Pope attendance zones, after previously comprising the Pope and Lassiter areas.

The Walton and Wheeler zones had been in Post 6, which was shifted to include the Smryrna-Vinings-Cumberland area, and which has been in Democratic hands since 2019.

Banks is part of 4-3 Republican majority on the school board. Three of those GOP seats will be on the ballot in 2024.

Banks has been a controversial figure, primarily about immigration, racial issues and COVID-19. Most recently, he sparked outrage about comments he made about Roman Catholicism.

In 2020, he had primary opposition and won without a runoff but won the general election by only 2,639 votes, his closest margin of victory.

Watching the Funds-Cobb posted the East Cobb News story about Banks on its Facebook page on Thursday, noting derogatory comments he made about Democratic board members:

“Whatever our children need and our educators deserve, it’s not a board member who continues to show us he’s got no intention of working with the Democratic board members… or representing all taxpayers and students.

“We hope the next candidates, on either side, agree with us…this attitude is out of date and out of touch with who we are and what Cobb stands for.”
Judge left a comment saying “I can’t wait to see what candidates announce over the next few months.”