Georgia Trend Daily – July 15, 2025
July 15, 2025 Georgia Council for the Arts
Georgia Council for the Arts: More Than $1.3 Million in Grants Announced Across 49 Counties
Staff reports that the Georgia Department of Economic Development (GDEcD) team specialized in supporting arts and culture, Georgia Council for the Arts, today announced that more than $1.3 million in competitive grant funding will be distributed to recipients in 49 counties across the state through its General Operating Support, Project, and Arts Education Program grants.
July 15, 2025 Georgia Trend – Exclusive!
She Knew It Was a Stroke. The Doctors Didn’t Believe Her.
Rebecca Wilbert reports that at 44, life changed in an instant for Tiffany Batiste, a high-achieving mother of two. A senior manager at an Atlanta sales organization and an Ironman athlete in training, she was used to pushing limits. But one afternoon, something felt off.
July 15, 2025 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
The CBS split from Atlanta News First could preview other big TV changes
Savannah Sicurella reports, in June, local television station owner Gray Media said Atlanta News First, or WANF/Channel 46, would end its 30-year affiliation with CBS in August to go independent. Instead of airing CBS programming, Gray Media plans to add more hours of local newscasts.
July 15, 2025 Albany Herald
Terrell County farmer wins 2025 peanut efficiency award amid challenging year for farmers
Lucille Lannigan reports that Riley Davis grows peanuts, corn and soybeans on land farmed by his family since the 1920s. He tends to each acre like an attentive parent, cultivating the land with love, paying attention to each acre’s unique needs.
July 15, 2025 Marietta Daily Journal
Letter shows Cobb’s threat to halt police services in Mableton
Isabelle Manders reports, under threat of losing police protection for its citizens, Mableton officials caved, agreeing to pay Cobb County’s $9.5 million price tag for policing the city’s nearly 80,000 residents. Mableton Mayor Michael Owens previously said the city was “forced” into accepting the deal, arguing he and the City Council had been backed against a wall.
July 15, 2025 The Current
Georgia governor calls for contingency budget plans amid ‘national’ changes
Maggie Lee reports that faced with sharp cuts to federal government funding and services under President Trump’s recently signed tax-and-spending bill, Republican Gov. Brian Kemp has directed state agencies to stick to about $32.5 billion in annual discretionary spending through June 2027 but also to prepare backup plans. In its budget instructions, the Governor’s Office of Planning and Budget asks agencies to “internally prepare thoughtful plans” for contingencies as the office monitors “economic trends and policy changes at the national level.”
July 15, 2025 Columbus Ledger-Enquirer
Trump cuts millions from 19 GA universities. Here’s what to know
Sundi Rose reports that Georgia’s higher education community is reeling after the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) slashed more than $74 million in federal research grants this spring, affecting universities and colleges across the state. Although the Trump administration has withheld funds from K-12 programs, the cuts to university and college programs are taking a significant toll on research and innovation.
July 15, 2025 Saporta Report
Folkston at center of ICE’s expansion plans
Tom Baxter reports that Alligator Alcatraz, the hastily built Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention center in the middle of the Florida Everglades, has been used for a lot of photo ops. But a few miles east of the Okefenokee Swamp, in the South Georgia town of Folkston, plans are moving forward for what will be the largest detention center in the country.
July 15, 2025 WABE
Georgia state lawmakers demand release of federal after-school funds, call for special session
Meimei Xu reports that state leaders and advocates in Georgia are putting pressure on Gov. Brian Kemp to demand that the Trump administration release federal funds it had withheld for after-school, summer and other educational programs. Democratic State Sen. RaShaun Kemp is also calling for a special session to give more state funding for providers, stating that the administration’s decision to freeze education funding was “reckless and callous.”
July 15, 2025 Georgia Recorder
Raffensperger calls for return of donations after Georgia Republican donor accused of Ponzi scheme
Maya Homan reports that Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has joined a growing chorus of voices calling for the return of political contributions from the now-defunct First Liberty Building and Loan, a Newnan-based lending firm with longstanding ties to the Republican Party. The company has come under fire after federal officials filed a lawsuit accusing First Liberty’s founder, Brant Frost IV, of running a Ponzi scheme that defrauded 300 investors out of at least $140 million.
July 15, 2025 Capitol Beat News
Democrat Ossoff far outpaces two GOP challengers for U.S. Senate
Ty Tagmi reports that the campaigns of the two announced Republicans for Georgia’s U.S. Senate seat held by Democrat Jon Ossoff are disclosing similar amounts of outside campaign money raised. The unofficial reports from the two GOP candidates, U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter, R-St. Simons, and John King, Georgia’s elected insurance and safety fire commissioner, had Carter slightly ahead of King in drawing money from donors.
July 15, 2025 Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Top Georgia Democrats mostly quiet about All-Star Game’s return to Atlanta
Greg Bluestein, Tia Mitchell, Patricia Murphy and Adam Beam report, the All-Star Game returns tonight to Atlanta, four years after Major League Baseball yanked the event from the city in protest of a GOP-backed election law that Democrats at the time decried as “Jim Crow 2.0.” While Georgia Republicans are taking a victory lap, the state’s top Democrats have been mostly silent about the league’s U-turn.
