www.thecentersquare.com – By Kim Jarrett | The Center Square – (The Center Square – ) 2025-05-13 12:27:00
A federal appeals court panel heard arguments from a Georgia group accusing True the Vote of voter intimidation. The group challenged 364,000 Georgia voters’ eligibility after the 2020 election, but Fair Fight argued it was an attempt to intimidate voters. A district judge ruled in 2024 that the challenge did not meet voter intimidation standards. True the Vote’s attorney claimed the group never contacted voters, while Fair Fight argued the mass challenge aimed to prevent voting. True the Vote, a Texas-based organization, said the case is crucial for defending election integrity.
(The Center Square) – A federal appeals court panel heard arguments Tuesday from a Georgia group accusing True the Vote of voter intimidation.
True the Vote challenged the eligibility of 364,000 Georgia voters after President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election to former President Joe Biden. The challenge came before a January 2021 runoffs in the U.S. Senate races that Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock won.
Fair Fight sued the group, saying the effort was an attempt to intimidate Georgia voters. U.S. District Judge Steve C. Jones ruled after a seven-day bench trial in 2024 that the challenge did not reach the standards for voter intimidation. The state did not provide records showing if any of the voter challenges were viable, according to testimony in Tuesday’s hearing.
Jake Evans, an attorney for True the Vote, told the three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals Court that the organization made no attempts to contact any of the voters in question.
“The attempted act was to submit the voter challenge,” Evans said. “The attempted act was not to contact or intimidate a voter.”
Uzoma Nkwonta, who presented the case for Fair Fight, said while there is no evidence in the record that there is a record of how many challenges were unsuccessful, no one presented evidence of a meritorious challenge or one that was not frivolous or incorrect.
“The natural cause of the mass challenge is intimidation, it’s preventing people from voting,” Nkwonta told the panel.
Fair Fight was founded by Democrat Stacey Abrams in 2018 after her unsuccessful gubernatorial run in 2018. Abrams lost the governor’s race again in 2022 to Republican Brian Kemp.
True the Vote is a Texas-based organization that says on its website it is challenging election security, transparency and integrity. Tuesday’s hearing is “one of the most consequential legal battles yet,” the group said.
“This isn’t just about one hearing – it’s about holding the line for election integrity and defending the voice of we the people,” the group said on its website.
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Center-Right
The article largely reports on the facts of a legal dispute concerning voter challenges in Georgia without overt editorializing, presenting statements and positions from both sides: True the Vote, a group focused on election integrity often associated with conservative causes, and Fair Fight, a voting rights organization founded by Democrat Stacey Abrams. While the piece includes neutral descriptions of the arguments and litigation history, it provides slightly more detailed emphasis on True the Vote’s perspective and uses phrases like “one of the most consequential legal battles yet,” which appears to reflect the language of True the Vote’s website. The article also notes the affiliations of the organizations, which adds context but can subtly frame the narrative along partisan lines. Overall, the tone is mostly factual but leans modestly toward a Center-Right perspective through the inclusion of the conservative group’s self-description and less detailed coverage of counterarguments.
SUMMARY: Senate Republicans passed a tax and spending bill including the largest Medicaid cuts since its 1960s inception, aiming to reduce spending by $1 trillion over ten years. The Congressional Budget Office projects nearly 12 million lower-income Americans will lose coverage by 2034, mainly targeting those who gained insurance via Medicaid expansion. Key measures include strict work requirements for beneficiaries and restrictions on state provider taxes, which could destabilize rural hospitals. Critics warn this will increase uninsured rates, medical debt, and healthcare access issues, while GOP leaders claim no eligible individuals will lose benefits. The bill awaits House approval amid concerns over its impact on the social safety net.
SUMMARY: Tuesday in the CSRA brings heat, humidity, and scattered to numerous thunderstorms, especially north and west of Augusta, with possible damaging winds of 40–60 mph and heavy rain causing localized flash flooding. A cold front from the west fuels this moisture and storm activity. Storm chances shift south Wednesday, with temperatures in the upper 80s to near 90, maintaining muggy summer conditions. By Thursday, drier air filters in, though some afternoon showers remain possible. For July 4th and the weekend, drier, sunnier, and seasonably hot weather is expected. A low-pressure system near the Florida Panhandle may develop, but impacts are uncertain and likely minimal.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked Georgia’s Senate Bill 351, which required social media companies to verify minors’ ages and obtain parental consent before account creation. The ruling, favoring social media coalition NetChoice, cited First Amendment concerns, noting the law’s exemptions created content-based speech restrictions likely unconstitutional. Judge Amy Totenberg highlighted burdens on free speech and privacy risks. However, the law’s sponsor, Sen. Jason Anavitarte, pointed to a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling supporting similar age verification laws, predicting SB 351 will eventually be enforced. Georgia’s Attorney General plans to appeal, emphasizing parental rights and child protection online.
Georgia kids can continue liking, commenting and subscribing without notifying their parents this summer after a federal judge put a temporary hold on the state’s new social media age verification law while the case moves forward – but the bill’s author says a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling bodes well for the ban.
Senate Bill 351, which was set to go into effect July 1, would require social media companies to get a parent’s permission before they allowed a minor to create an account. All Georgians would also have to verify their age before accessing websites with material deemed harmful to minors.
On Thursday, Judge Amy Totenberg of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia ruled in favor of NetChoice, a coalition of social media companies, who argued that the law as written would likely violate free speech protections.
“The Court does not doubt the dangers posed by young people’s overwhelming exposure to social media,” Totenberg wrote. “But, in its effort to aid parents, the Act’s solution creates serious obstacles for all Georgians, including teenagers, to engage in protected speech activities and would highly likely be unconstitutional.”
Totenberg said the law would curb the speech rights of young people, impose a burden on all Georgians to participate in online speech, potentially put Georgians’ private data at risk and step into parents’ decisions on how to raise their children.
But Totenberg said the law’s biggest downfall comes in its long list of exemptions, which include news, sports, and entertainment sites, interactive gaming platforms, streaming services and more.
“For example, SB 351 would presumably apply to the Georgia Bulldogs Reddit forum, which features user-generated content. But it would exempt Barstool Sports, which features provider-generated content. It would apply to news coverage posted by users on X, but not news coverage posted by The New York Times to its own liveblog.”
Totenberg found that amounts to a content-based restriction on speech, which triggers a higher level of scrutiny – which she said Georgia’s law doesn’t meet.
“Because of the enormous burdens imposed on the First Amendment rights of children, adults, and social media platforms — along with the significant tailoring issues inherent in the law — even the State’s serious interest here cannot justify SB 351 under the First Amendment’s rigorous standards,” she said.
NetChoice celebrated the win in a statement.
“This is a major victory for free speech, constitutional clarity and the rights of all Georgians to engage in public discourse without intrusive government overreach,” said Chris Marchese, NetChoice director of litigation. “We are grateful the court recognized what we’ve long argued: SB 351 isn’t just poorly crafted — it’s profoundly unconstitutional.”
But the bill’s author, state Sen. Jason Anavitarte, a Dallas Republican who is now the Senate majority leader, said their victory is likely to be short-lived.
In a statement, Anavitarte pointed to a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that backed a Texas state law requiring age verification for pornographic websites.
“One day after liberal Obama Appointee, US District Court Judge, Amy Totenberg, issued an injunction preventing Georgia’s age verification law from taking effect, The Supreme Court found that laws like SB 351 ‘have only an incidental effect on protected speech and that The First Amendment leaves undisturbed States’ traditional power to prevent minors from accessing speech that is obscene from their perspective….Requiring proof of age is an ordinary and appropriate means of enforcing an age-based limit on obscenity to minors,’” Anavitarte said.
“Based on Friday’s ruling at The Supreme Court, Judge Totenberg should be left with no choice but to allow SB 351 to go into effect,” he added. “I am immensely grateful for Justice Clarence Thomas’ well written opinion and remain optimistic that SB 351 will go into effect in its entirety.”
Attorney General Chris Carr’s said Carr intends to appeal the ruling.
“We will continue to defend commonsense measures that empower parents and protect our children online,” said Carr spokesperson Kara Murray.
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Georgia Recorder is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Georgia Recorder maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jill Nolin for questions: info@georgiarecorder.com.
Note: The following A.I. based commentary is not part of the original article, reproduced above, but is offered in the hopes that it will promote greater media literacy and critical thinking, by making any potential bias more visible to the reader –Staff Editor.
Political Bias Rating: Centrist
This article provides a balanced report on Georgia’s social media age verification law by presenting both the legal challenge emphasizing free speech concerns and the bill author’s perspective highlighting parental control and child protection. It quotes judicial reasoning against the law’s constitutionality alongside statements from the Republican bill sponsor and the Attorney General, showing arguments on both sides without overt editorializing. The tone and framing remain largely factual and neutral, aiming to inform readers about the ongoing legal and political debate without taking a partisan stance.
