2030 Project
Posts
The Public Trust, Tested in Classrooms and Courtrooms

The Public Trust, Tested in Classrooms and Courtrooms

July 30, 2026

In partnership with

Most Men Notice Aging All at Once

Men's skin is 25% thicker than women's. That sounds like an advantage. It isn't. Thicker skin delays the visible signs of aging — until collagen drops. And when it drops, it drops hard: heavier eye bags, deeper wrinkles, dark spots, loss of firmness. All at once. Most men were never taught to get ahead of it. That's where Particle Face Cream comes in. A 6-in-1 formula engineered specifically for men's skin — reduces eye bags, dark spots, and wrinkles, restores firmness, hydrates deeply, revives dull tone. Two minutes a day. No complicated routine. Over 1,000,000 men already use it. Try it risk-free with a 30-day money-back guarantee. 20% off with code BH20.

20% Off With BH20

✅This Week in GA

Apalachee High School shooter sentenced to life without parole
Colt Gray, now 16, was sentenced Tuesday for the September 2024 shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder that killed two students, two teachers and wounded nine others. Gray pleaded guilty last week to all 55 charges against him. Over three days of sentencing testimony, prosecutors laid out evidence that Gray had closely tracked and idolized past mass shooters, while the defense argued he'd been failed by a chaotic and neglectful upbringing. He was too young to face the death penalty, and the judge handed down the maximum sentence available instead. His father, Colin Gray, who gifted his son the assault rifle was sentenced to 15 years in prison today.

Storms knock out power across North Georgia
Severe storms Tuesday night brought tornado warnings and flash flooding to North Georgia, leaving more than 16,000 customers without power across Georgia Power and several electric co-ops. Gilmer County saw one of its worst flash floods in years, with nearly 4 inches of rain in a single hour in Ellijay. Emory Decatur Hospital also lost power, delaying some scheduled procedures.

Wellstar cutting more than 700 jobs
Wellstar Health System, one of Georgia's largest employers with more than 35,000 workers, confirmed this week that it's eliminating 761 administrative and corporate positions. The cuts land at a moment when Georgia's health systems are already navigating tight margins and rising costs.

An $87 million preview of the fall campaign
Republican Rick Jackson is putting serious money behind a new ad campaign ahead of this fall's election, the largest general election ad buy in the race so far. The ads target Democratic nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms' record as Atlanta's former mayor, particularly her handling of the 2020 unrest and policing, while using current Mayor Andre Dickens as a contrast point for how the city has changed since. It's a preview of the line of attack Georgians will likely hear through November.

Rural Georgia Deserves Repsect. So Does Bottoms.

“Where is Keisha Lance Bottoms?” A question many Democratic voters seem to have following Rick Jackson’s on-the-ground efforts in Atlanta. Amidst the backlash and commentary surrounding Rick Jackson’s efforts, Keisha Lance Bottoms has launched her very own Southeast Georgia Healthcare Tour.

Bottoms commenced her on-the-ground efforts yesterday, July 29, 2026. Her tour will feature six stops in Statesboro, Jesup, Woodbine, Brunswick, Richmond Hill, and concluding in Savannah at the Georgia Democratic Convention. As Jackson made his rounds, voters questioned where Keisha was and how she was going to “get out the vote.” Democratic candidate for Georgia governor Keisha Lance Bottoms made her first stop in Statesboro Thursday as part of a Southeast Georgia healthcare tour, hosting a roundtable with local healthcare workers and the Statesboro mayor to hear concerns about rural healthcare access. Bottoms, the former Atlanta mayor and Democratic nominee for governor, said the feedback gathered during the tour will help shape policy. “It’s always great to get feedback on the ground because it helps shape policy and helps shape the vision for how we can accomplish things quickly when, God willing, I’m elected governor,” Bottoms said.

However, it feels reminiscent of the 2024 Presidential Campaign with Kamala Harris. No matter what these Black female candidates do, the complaints never cease to end. “You have to be twice as good to get half as far,” embodies the struggles that these candidates seem to face. Despite the ridicule, Bottoms continues to fight for her respect and share of Georgia. While Jackson has made billions exploiting Georgians and their healthcare, Bottoms embraces the journey to making healthcare better for Georgians. She's fighting for a state where being a billionaire isn't a prerequisite for being heard.

A National Directive With a Georgia Address

A year ago, President Trump signed a national security memo most Americans never heard of. Now, its effects are showing up in a federal courthouse in Atlanta.

The directive is called NSPM-7, "Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence." Signed in September 2025, it doesn't create new legal powers. Instead, it redirects existing counterterrorism tools, built for foreign threats, toward domestic political targets. The memo instructs the FBI, DOJ, Treasury, and IRS to investigate individuals and organizations tied to vaguely defined ideologies, including "anti-Americanism," "anti-capitalism," and hostility toward "traditional American views."

This is no longer theoretical:

The Atlanta Charges: In June 2026, federal prosecutors charged two activists, Katie Kloth and Tyler Norman, with federal arson offenses connected to the "Cop City" protests, the same week Georgia's Attorney General secured a new state indictment against them. Federal and state officials are now pursuing parallel prosecutions, both invoking the "anti-Antifa" framing that defines NSPM-7 itself.
The SPLC Fraud Charges: In April 2026, the DOJ aggressively deployed its financial toolkit, indicting the Southern Poverty Law Center on federal wire fraud and money laundering charges over its tracking and informant operations. The SPLC has fiercely denied the charges, calling the case a weaponized retribution campaign.

The administration’s expanding definition of domestic terrorism has triggered a wave of resistance across civil rights groups. NAACP President Derrick Johnson responded plainly: "Trump's DOJ has been weaponized by dangerous forces. Every organization and individual engaged in social justice should be alarmed."

The actions by the Trump Administration fit a pattern Georgians have watched all year: an FBI raid on the Fulton County election hub, the firing of election commissioners who wouldn't fall in line, and now federal and state prosecutors moving in lockstep against activists and civil rights organizations. The tools change. The target doesn't.

Leading national advocacy groups are choosing to fight the narrative publicly before they face the crosshairs. Color Of Change launched a sweeping public awareness campaign warning its members that NSPM-7 intentionally blurs the line between violent acts and protected dissent. In public alerts, the organization stated that Black organizers and justice movements historically pay the heaviest price when the federal government treats political disagreement as a national security threat. By forcing these directives into the light, civil rights groups are trying to ensure that the right to organize does not disappear by executive memo.

Heroes vs. Villains: Who Republicans Really Are.

Despite the current levels of partisanship and division within the country, there are still many issues where an overwhelming majority of Americans agree. One issue with broad bipartisan support is the banning of elected officials from trading stocks. According to a study conducted by the University of Maryland, a congressional stock trading ban is supported by 86% of Americans with equal support on both sides of the aisle.

With congress so divided and seemingly unable to accomplish anything of substance, passing a stock trading ban would be the perfect way to tear down partisan divides and help restore trust in the government, while also taking steps towards reducing corruption. However, rather than come together to pass an agreeable, comprehensive law that would actually prohibit elected officials from trading stocks, Congressional Republicans have opted for political theater and public relation stunts.

Just two months ago, Senator Jon Ossoff introduced the “Ban Congressional Stock Trading Act,” a comprehensive, detailed bill which would require all sitting members of congress to either divest their holdings or place them in a qualified blind trust. However, Senate Republicans took issue with the bill, largely due to its rigidity and language surrounding cryptocurrency.

When Senator Ossoff attempted to pass the bill by unanimous consent, Senator Lummis of Wyoming (a Republican) objected, and instead voiced her support for a Republican backed House bill titled the “Stop Insider Trading Act.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ht32Yroyqu0

Last week, the “Stop Insider Trading Act” passed the House of Representatives in a vote of 218-211, thanks to overwhelming Republican support. Despite the bill’s similar name to the one proposed by Senator Ossoff, its content could not be more different.

While Senator Ossoff’s bill would prohibit members of congress from buying, selling, or holding individual stocks, the Republican bill only prohibits the purchasing of publicly traded stocks. This means members of congress would still be able to sell their private holdings based on their access to privileged information and make decisions that directly influence the value of their personal assets.

Perhaps more egregiously, at the last minute, Republicans tacked on a measure to the act that imposes unnecessarily burdensome voting restrictions. As such, the “Stop Insider Trading Act” would be more aptly titled the “Stop Buying One Specific Type of Stock and Restrict Voting Rights Act.”

Thus, rather than pass a bill which would actually solve a problem the vast majority of Americans agree on, Republicans have chosen to promote a bill which only provides minor restrictions on insider trading while simultaneously threatening voting rights.

But here’s the thing: Republicans know this bill will fail. They know Democrats who care more about governing than optics will vote down this nonsense bill, preventing what little stock trading restrictions are included from going into effect, while going on the record opposing a bill titled the “Stop Insider Trading Act,” a win win for Republicans.

As such, when this bill inevitably stalls in the Senate, Republicans will have successfully dodged passing a stock trading ban while trying to make it seem as if they are the ones pushing for change. Republicans in congress have proved time and time again they care more about optics and reelection than passing laws which benefit the American people.

Don’t fall for their act.

A $20 Billion Data Center Deal, and a One-Day Notice

Georgia Recorder

Data centers, the physical facilities that power everything from cloud storage to AI chatbots, are popping up across Georgia faster than almost anywhere else in the country. Georgia now hosts more than 200 data center facilities statewide, driven by low business costs and generous tax exemptions that have made the state one of the most attractive locations in the Southeast.

The latest and largest example: OpenAI announced a $20 billion data center campus in Effingham County, called "Project Camellia." Georgia Power will supply the facility with 3.2 gigawatts of power, enough for roughly 2 million homes, delivered in phases through 2032.

Effingham County's own Board of Commissioners, Industrial Development Authority, and school district approved the deal, calling it one of the largest private investments in coastal Georgia's history. But residents got just one day's notice before a public open house on July 23, and nearly 1,000 people showed up, many of them frustrated that a deal this size moved forward before they had any real chance to weigh in.

Water is one of the biggest concerns driving that frustration. According to the International Energy Agency, a typical 100-megawatt hyperscale data center in the U.S. uses about 2 million liters of water a day, roughly the water use of 6,500 homes. OpenAI says Project Camellia will use a closed-loop cooling system designed to minimize water draw, but concerns like these have fueled growing opposition to data center construction across the state.

That opposition now includes a candidate for governor. Democratic nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms has proposed a statewide moratorium on new data center construction if elected. Gov. Brian Kemp pushed back this week, calling artificial intelligence "scary" but "essential," and calling Bottoms' proposed pause "irresponsible."

Data centers aren't going anywhere in Georgia. But Project Camellia is a preview of the fight ahead: a state government eager to attract massive investment, and residents increasingly asking to be part of the conversation before the deal is done.

What Georgia Learned From Apalachee, and What It Still Hasn't

As students across Georgia prepare to return to classrooms this fall, the shadow of the Apalachee High School shooting still lingers. Just days ago, Colt Gray, the gunman responsible for the September 2024 shooting at Apalachee High School, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole after pleading guilty to 55 charges related to the attack that killed two students and two teachers. The sentencing closed one chapter of a tragedy that shocked Georgia, but it did not close the larger conversation about school safety.

School shootings have long felt like tragedies that happened somewhere else. Then it happened in Barrow County. In a Georgia school. To Georgia families. The attack exposed weaknesses in how schools, families, law enforcement agencies, and mental health systems identify and respond to warning signs before violence occurs.

Now as another school year begins, state leaders say they are taking action to make schools safer.

Following the Apalachee shooting, lawmakers passed House Bill 268, the Comprehensive School Safety & Student Well-being Act, one of the most significant school safety packages in Georgia history. Signed into law in 2025, the legislation requires major security and mental health upgrades across Georgia schools. Its panic-alert provisions are formally known as "Ricky and Alyssa's Law," named for Richard "Ricky" Aspinwall, the Apalachee coach and teacher killed in the shooting, and Alyssa Alhadeff, killed in the 2018 Parkland shooting in Florida.

Most notable changes are:

Every public school must have a mobile panic alert system connected to emergency responders.
Schools must maintain digital campus maps that can be accessed quickly during emergencies.
Districts are required to provide anonymous reporting systems so students can report threats or suspicious behavior.

These measures aren't untested. Barrow County had tested its panic button system at a school near Apalachee High just hours before the shooting began. During the attack itself, teachers and administrators sent more than 20 alerts through the system, helping direct police to the shooter's location and cutting short what could have been an even deadlier attack. The state budget also included funding for school security grants and behavioral health initiatives, signaling that school safety is no longer being treated as a secondary issue in Georgia politics.

Despite reforms to school safety procedures, very little has been done to address the broader issue of gun violence. After Apalachee, Democratic lawmakers introduced bills that would have required Georgians to safely store firearms in homes with children. Republican leadership did not bring those bills to a vote. Instead, the GOP-controlled legislature moved to block local governments from enacting their own gun storage requirements, like an ordinance in Savannah requiring firearms to be locked up when left in unattended cars. Gov. Kemp vetoed that specific bill in May, citing concerns about police liability, not the underlying policy, and Republicans have already revived a similar measure this year. For gun safety advocates, it's a reminder that Georgia's response to Apalachee was significant on school security, but incomplete on the question of how guns are stored in the first place.

The question facing Georgia isn’t only which laws passed and which didn’t. It’s whether the ones that did will work statewide the way they worked that morning in Barrow County.

Legislation can create requirements, but implementation determines success. Schools must train staff, maintain emergency plans, educate students on reporting systems, and ensure that mental health resources are available when students need them, all while already-stretched school staff and administrators absorb new responsibilities on top of existing ones. Georgia law already requires schools to conduct emergency planning and safety drills, but those measures are only effective if they are taken seriously and consistently, and if schools have the staffing and funding to do it.

For parents dropping their children off on the first day of school, the hope is simple: that no community will have to endure what Barrow County experienced.

Georgia Deserves Better than a Formula Created in 1985

Georgia is booming. Over the past decade, private investment has flourished, and the state has welcomed thousands of new residents annually. And yet, too many Georgia students attend underfunded, understaffed, and unequally resourced schools. State leaders laud increased education budgets, but spending into a structurally broken system fails to serve every child.

The current funding formula was created in 1985 through the Quality Basic Education (QBE) Act. It has changed very little in the past forty years, failing to account for modern classroom technologies, school safety initiatives, and an ever-worsening youth mental health crisis. Georgia remains one of only six states that doesn't provide extra funding for students living in poverty. Lawmakers piloted a small $15.3 million "opportunity weight" grant in 2025, a first step advocates had sought for years, but let that funding expire this session rather than making it permanent or building it into the formula itself.

During the 2026 session, lawmakers did make one genuine investment in QBE: $70.4 million for literacy coaches in every elementary school, funded permanently through the formula. It's real money and a real win. But it illustrates the same structural problem. That funding flows equally to every school regardless of how many of its students live in poverty, the exact kind of targeted, needs-based investment the expired opportunity weight was designed to provide. So the story ultimately remains the same: the QBE formula is not a reflection of the needs of students today.

Beyond this formula, Georgia relies heavily on local property taxes to fund public education. This means wealthy districts can raise millions while rural and low-income communities struggle to provide basic services. Access becomes reliant upon zip code rather than universal. This, in turn, only furthers a cyclical stagnation.

Even Georgia's most celebrated education program reflects this same divide. The merit-based HOPE Scholarship provides tuition assistance for Georgia students, which sounds great in theory. But as the graph above shows, the pattern is stark: at the University of Georgia, where median family income tops $100,000, 81 percent of in-state students receive HOPE or the full-ride Zell Miller Scholarship. Statewide, only 44 percent of bachelor's degree students receive either scholarship. The higher a school's median family income, the larger its share of HOPE scholars. This is not a representation of academic ability. It is a socioeconomic reflection. Thanks to a state budget surplus of $14 billion, improving public education is not a financial issue. What it is and what it has been for forty years now, is a problem of political will.

What’s Inspiring Us This Week:

A new weekly feature, written by one of our interns. Because we all need a pick-me-up.

Okefenokee Swamp becomes a Heritage Site

Georgia Recorder

On July 25th, the Okefenokee Swamp officially became a UNESCO World Heritage Site during the World Heritage Committee Meeting in Busan, South Korea.

As a 438,000-acre wetland, the Okefenokee is the largest intact blackwater swamp ecosystem in North America. Historically, the swamp has been an important ancestral site to the Indigenous Muscogee Nation.

Since 1982, Georgians have been advocating for the Okefenokee Swamp to be designated as a World Heritage Site. In 2026, this has finally come true, thanks to a bipartisan group of Georgia congressmembers, led by Sen. Jon Ossoff and Rep. Buddy Carter, who urged the Department of the Interior to pursue UNESCO designation.

This UNESCO designation officially means the Okefenokee Swamp is now globally recognized as a place of outstanding universal value to humanity. The United States government is now internationally obligated to protect this area's ecosystem. Now, the Okefenokee joins the list of sites that includes the Great Pyramids, the Galapagos Islands, and the Grand Canyon.

In a statement, Stacy Funderburke, vice president of the central Southeast region at the Conservation Fund, expressed the importance of this designation.

"This designation isn't just an honor for all Georgians, it's a validation of all of the conservation work we've been doing around the Okefenokee for the last 25 years," said Funderburke. "Today the world is recognizing what we've always known, that this area is irreplaceable and worth protecting at every turn."

This designation serves as a testament to the power of Georgians' collaboration and perseverance. After decades of persistence, the Okefenokee's UNESCO designation is more than a label, it is a reminder that dedicated advocacy can have a lasting impact.

- Marin, Intern, The 2030 Project