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GA Today: Georgia women in politics
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You've arrived at the online edition of the Sept. 22 Georgia Today newsletter, a twice-weekly publication featuring original stories from GPB News reporters and the latest headlines from around the state.
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Now, the news:
The party gap with women candidates is closing nationally — but not in Georgia yet
This year’s midterm election has a sharpened focus on Georgia women — who make up more than half of the state’s electorate — as issues like abortion rights fuel efforts to mobilize voters across the political spectrum.
Although nearly a third of the candidates running for statewide office in November are women, none of them are Republicans.
A stark contrast is easily seen between nominees of the two majority parties. Democrats boast a majority female and racially diverse statewide slate while Republicans candidates are all men and all but three are white.
- “The Democratic ticket in Georgia looks like Georgia," gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams said in July. "We are the most racially diverse. We're the only gender diverse ticket.”
Former U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler is looking to change that, telling GPB's Riley Bunch that although the GOP doesn't play "identity politics," she's still mobilizing conservative voters and boosting campaigns of Republican women candidates.
POLITICAL HEADLINES
- Battleground: Ballot Box | The positives and pitfalls of political polling in Georgia
- Monmouth poll finds Georgians divided on trusting Walker, Warnock to handle key issues in Senate
- Marjorie Taylor Greene leads GOP drive to criminalize gender-affirming care for transgender youth
The Muscogee get their say in national park plan for Georgia
When Tracie Revis climbs the Great Temple Mound, rising nine stories above the Ocmulgee River in the center of present-day Georgia, she walks in the steps of her Muscogean ancestors who were forcibly removed to Oklahoma 200 years ago.
- "This is lush, gorgeous land. The rivers are gorgeous here," Revis said. "We believe that those ancestors are still here, their songs are still here, their words are still here, their tears are still here. And so we speak to them. You know, we still honor those that have passed on."
If approved by Congress after a three-year federal review wraps up this fall, the mounds in Macon would serve as the gateway to a new Ocmulgee National Park and Preserve, protecting 54 river-miles of floodplain where nearly 900 more sites of cultural or historic significance have been identified.
WWII veteran and 'Toccoa Original' dies at age 101
Funeral services were scheduled this week for a World War II veteran well known throughout Northeast Georgia. James "Pee Wee" Martin died Sept. 11.
He was among the last remaining of about 6,000 men who arrived at Curahee Mountain, near Toccoa, to train as one of the country's first paratroopers.
In 2015, he told the American Veterans Center about jumping into Normandy on D-Day.
- "We had three jump zones," he said in this video. "Jump zone D in the history books is called 'the slaughterhouse.' Intelligence didn't tell us what was down there. There were two divisions of SS and two divisions of Panzer grenadiers and we jumped right on top of them."
He also fought in the Battle of the Bulge, earning a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart, among other honors, for his service.
Recognizing unconscious bias from inside the mascot costume
The amusement park Sesame Place is facing a multi-million-dollar lawsuit as more Black families come forward on social media to document how their Black children have been shunned by some of their favorite Sesame Street characters like Rosita and Ernie.
Glen Street operates Mascot U, which has trained mascots and characters in costume all over the United States, including in Georgia at Georgia Southwestern State University, Mercer University and Savannah State University.
- '"I think that organizations large and small are becoming more aware of things that maybe society was blind to before. So it's not just the mascot training," Street said of companies' new efforts to address bias in the future.
Savannah singer-songwriter takes TikTok by storm with her live streams from Forsyth Park
Viral memes. Funny cat videos. Gen Z dancers. Auto-Tune remixes. Those are some of the things that might come to mind when you think of TikTok.
But the app is also transporting viewers to Forsyth Park in Savannah — specifically, to a new vendor of sorts at the weekly farmers' market: 25-year-old singer-songwriter Clara Waidley, whose sidewalk performances have taken TikTok by storm.
Her latest composition is an autobiographical folk-pop tune called “25,” but she also live-streams heartfelt ruminations about her family and travel experiences, and recommends thrift-store finds to her more than 118,000 followers on TikTok.
- “I would say I've had up to 5,000 people on a stream before and then as little as 100 sometimes,” Waidley said. “But it's always great no matter what.”
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