by Ross Williams and Stanley Dunlap, Georgia Recorder
March 29, 2025

This story was updated at 5 p.m. on Saturday, March 29, 2025. 

Back by popular demand, it’s nuggets, tasty little tidbits of news from the Gold Dome. 

Lawmakers are getting ready for the last day of the 2025 legislative session on Friday, but they still drop some nuggets everywhere they go.

This week: Democratic discontent comes to the dome, a ride-or-die always Trumper gets rewarded with a new gig and some funny money, and state leaders try to decide whether to add more real money into their yearly salaries. 

Pay bump flop

House lawmakers quickly swatted down a last-minute Senate plan to give the governor and other statewide officials pay raises. 

The Senate had added the salary bumps Thursday to a bill adjusting the pay of judges at higher levels in Georgia. Under the plan, Gov. Brian Kemp would have been tied with New York Gov. Kathy Hochul for the highest earning governor in the country. 

“You may have seen a little something about the amendment in the news over the last 24 hours,” the bill’s original sponsor, Elberton Republican Rep. Rob Leverett, said to his colleagues Friday. 

“I think that is a discussion we as a body need to have at some point, but we shouldn’t have it as an amendment to a bill in the last two or three days of session,” Leverett said. “I believe it needs to be thought through a little more and it needs a little more study.”

Some senators also tried to increase lawmaker pay in another judicial pay bill focused on superior court judges.

Critics argued that the legislative pay amendment would sabotage a bill intended to create uniform statewide pay for Georgia Superior Court judges. The proposed pay raise amendment to House Bill 85 would have increased the salaries of lawmakers from $24,341 to about $55,000.

Sen. Randal Mangham, a Stone Mountain Democrat, argued it would put Georgia lawmakers in line with the national average of $44,320 in 2024, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

He referenced the limited funding he receives for his staff. 

“$7,000 for an entire year with my budget for expenses to run the people’s business. It’s a $40 billion enterprise,” Mangham said, referring to the state budget.

Sen. John Kennedy, a Macon Republican, urged senators prior to voting to consider how passing the amendment would come across to the taxpayers.

“Colleagues, are you willing to look at your constituents in the eye and tell them you need more of their tax dollars in your pocket and out of their pocket?” Kennedy said.

The debate ended with the legislative pay amendments failing 33 to 18 before the superior court legislation passed with nearly unanimous support.

Dems in disarray

In the wake of a bitter loss to President Donald Trump, Democrats across the country are trying to figure out where it all went wrong. 

A recent Politico analysis of a Quinnipiac poll found that for the first time in the poll’s history, a majority of Democrats view members of their party in Congress unfavorably. Just 40 percent of Democrats polled said the party is doing a good job, compared to 49 percent who said the opposite. 

A March NBC News poll found 65% of self-identified Democrats want the party to fight Trump rather than seek compromise, even if that leads to gridlock in Washington. Around this time in Trump’s first term, only 33% of Democrats felt that way, the pollster found.

That discontent could be springing forth at the state level as well. 

The Forsyth County Democrats released a statement castigating Democrats in Congress and the state Legislature for “voting like Republicans.”

“With democracy itself at stake – and with the public’s frustration with figures like Donald Trump and Elon Musk high – we cannot afford to hand political or legislative victories to Republicans or to validate their agenda while our constituents and values hang in the balance,” the statement reads. “Likewise, here in Georgia, amid widespread discontent with Governor Brian Kemp’s hard-right legislative push, it is imperative that Democrats stand together rather than bolster Kemp’s initiatives that harm the public interest.”

The statement lists three pieces of legislation where some Democrats broke rank – Senate Bill 68, Kemp’s priority lawsuit overhaul bill, supported by three Democrats; Senate Bill 144, liability protections for fertilizer and pesticide manufacturers with the support of nine Democrats and House Bill 267, which bans transgender girls from playing on girls’ school sports teams and got votes from three Dems. 

The local parties in Fulton and Gwinnett counties have also issued statements co-signing the message from Forsyth County.

Trump U.S. Treasurer Legislature’s newly popular kid

Republican Sen. Brandon Beach’s selection as President Donald Trump’s choice to become the next U.S. Treasurer has boosted his popularity.

Beach signed fake currency featuring the face of Senate Majority Leader Steve Gooch reading “In Goochie We Trust” that was passed around the Capitol last week. The 63-year-old Beach’s signature as U.S. treasurer could soon be emblazoned on the front of real legal tender in the future.   

The senator’s role in state government will end shortly after the Legislature gavels out on April 4 for the final day of the 2025 session.

Beach will act as a liaison between the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve, as well as oversee the U.S. Mint and Fort Knox. The president is boosting a conspiracy theory these days that some of the gold is missing from Fort Knox and says he plans to go to Kentucky to see for himself if the country’s treasure is still secured. 

Inside the Senate chamber Wednesday, fellow Trump loyalist GOP Lt. Gov. Burt Jones celebrated Beach’s new job opportunity. 

Jones recalled that not long ago they were part of a small cadre of hardline Trump supporters in the Senate who were persona non grata, even among fellow Republicans.

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 John McCosh for questions: info@georgiarecorder.com.

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