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Georgia Today: Voting machine tests; Incarcerated while pregnant; Fringed campion protection efforts
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On the Wednesday, Aug. 14 edition of Georgia Today: Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger puts the state's voting machines to the test; Georgia women continue to speak out about horrific treatment of pregnant women in prison; and we'll look at an effort to protect a native flower in Macon from invasive plants.
Peter Biello: Welcome to the Georgia Today podcast from GPB News. Today is Wednesday, Aug. 14. I'm Peter Biello. On today's episode, secretary of State Brad Raffensperger puts the state's voting machines to the test. Georgia women continue to speak out about horrific treatment of pregnant women in prison. And we'll look at an effort to protect a native flower in Macon from invasive plants. These stories and more are coming up on this edition of Georgia Today.
Story 1:
Peter Biello: A data leak in the secretary of state's new voter registration cancellation website earlier this month exposed a vulnerability in the system. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger is addressing concerns over the vulnerability. The data was leaked only briefly, and Raffensperger says no legitimate registrations were canceled. Raffensperger said the portal is helpful to voters moving out of state. Critics of the website say it could result in erroneous cancellations.
Peter Biello: Meanwhile, Raffensperger, Georgia's top election official, is visiting election offices across the state to make sure voting machines are running properly. Yesterday, he visited Northwest Georgia's Paulding County. GPB's Sarah Kallis reports.
Sarah Kallis: Raffensperger says the logic and accuracy tests conducted on all machines before voting begins is mandatory, and assures voting machines are accurate. While there, he also addressed false claims made by former President Donald Trump about Georgia's election integrity.
Brad Raffensperger: I don't want anyone not to show up because they somehow think that it's not a level playing field, it's a level playing field. So if the candidates want to win elections, they need to turn out their people.
Sarah Kallis: Raffensperger emphasized that Georgia elections are safe and secure. He also said the secretary of state's office is taking proactive measures to prevent cyberattacks ahead of the November election. For GPB News, I'm Sarah Kallis in Paulding County.
Story 3:
Peter Biello: Federal prosecutors in Savannah are launching a public awareness campaign aimed at cracking down on so-called straw purchases of firearms. GPB's Benjamin Payne reports.
Benjamin Payne: Buying a gun for someone who legally can't own one is known as straw purchasing. It's punishable by up to 15 years in federal prison and a quarter million-dollar fine. More than 30 billboards in the Savannah area are spreading the message "Don't lie for the other guy," in an effort to stop the practice. Jill Steinberg is U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Georgia.
Jill Steinberg: Whether it's a felon, a person with a domestic violence protective order, or an individual with a serious mental illness who should not have a gun, that all makes our communities less safe.
Benjamin Payne: Prosecutors say two people in Statesboro recently straw purchased 17 guns for a family member in New York City, with one of those guns eventually being used in a homicide. A bipartisan law signed by President Biden in 2022 stiffened anti-straw-purchasing laws. For GPB News, I'm Benjamin Payne in Savannah.
Story 4:
Peter Biello: An Atlanta man being held captive by the Taliban in Afghanistan says he's losing hope of being returned to the U.S. Former Delta Air Lines mechanic George Glezman traveled to Afghanistan as a tourist in 2022, and has been detained now for 20 months. In a phone conversation recorded by his wife two weeks ago and shared with GPB today, Glezman blamed his situation on the Afghan and U.S. governments.
George Glezman: I'm done. I'm done here. The mental stress. I mean, I have stress nonstop, 24/7. My neck, my back hurt. I have no peace.
Peter Biello: However, his family members and their attorney, Dennis Fitzpatrick, are not giving up.
Dennis Fitzpatrick: It's going to take a productive and focused negotiation by the U.S. government, but we think it can be accomplished.
Peter Biello: A State Department spokesperson says the administration is urgently working to obtain his release.
Story 5:
Peter Biello: Georgia women are describing horrific experiences of being pregnant and giving birth while incarcerated. At a hearing today in Atlanta, Tiana Hill describes being held in the Clayton County Jail while pregnant for seven months, finally giving birth. She testified that guards at the facility denied she was pregnant and she received no prenatal care. She told the committee she gave birth in the infirmary on a metal bed with no privacy from other incarcerated people.
Tiana Hill: They were just standing at the door looking, and I'm stuck naked with my legs wide open. I felt faint, like I was going to pass out, but I could see all these people around me. My baby was born premature in my panties.
Peter Biello: Hill says her baby died five days after he was born and she was given no explanation. The Clayton County Sheriff's Office did not provide a comment on Hill's experience. Her story is similar to that of Jessica Umberger of Atlanta, who testified earlier this month that while at a prison medical facility, she was coerced by corrections staff to deliver via C-section. And their comments come amid an ongoing federal investigation into the mistreatment of pregnant women in U.S. prisons and jails, which has found more than 200 reports of human rights abuses.
Story 6:
Peter Biello: Across Georgia, there are at least 100 rare or endangered plants, surviving largely through the work of scientists and volunteer conservationists. Today, habitats broken up into private property and the challenges of climate change give that work more urgency. From a patch of woods in the middle of Macon, GPB's Grant Blankenship has more.
Grant Blankenship: Very early in the morning, on a July day that's yet to heat up, about 15 volunteers spread out in the dappled light of a hardwood forest to weed. They work by hand. No rakes or shovels. That's because Heather Bowman Cutway wants them to preserve the plant she hopes is below the weeds, which she taught them to ID on site before they started working.
Heather Bowman Cutway: It's the little rosettes that are throughout here.
Grant Blankenship: Bowman Cutway is a biologist at Mercer University in Macon, and she's showing this group of amateur plant enthusiasts and scientists a federally endangered plant called the fringed campion.
Heather Bowman Cutway: It is a clonal species, and so it will send out runners and a lot.
Grant Blankenship: Bowman Cutway never intended this to be her main topic of research.
Heather Bowman Cutway: I started it pretty randomly. I put out a call to a fellow botanist being like, "I need student projects. And he was like, "how about a federally endangered plant?" And I was like, "that seems really exciting."
Grant Blankenship: She's been hunting in remnant tracts of forest squeezed between human development like this ever since, to the ground hugging plant with a flower like a frilly pink carnation.
Heather Bowman-Cutway: Research has really shown that, these — these urban places tend to be a really nice reservoir of this plant.
Grant Blankenship: "Urban" because these breathtaking woods are hemmed in on all sides by the city of Macon; "reservoir," because fringed campion is next to impossible to grow from seed. Conservation means keeping plants alive here and cloning them in greenhouses. Just where this spot and others like it are is kept top secret to protect against poachers. But luckily the landowners are excited to work with Bowman Cutway and with Michelle Elmore, lead fringe campion recovery biologist with the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Michelle Elmore: You know, it's only occurs in Georgia and Florida.
Grant Blankenship: So you'll find fringed campion in here in the middle of Georgia and on the Apalachicola River on the Florida Panhandle. And that's it. Elmore says big storms imperil those Florida plants.
Michelle Elmore: Hurricane Michael really impacted a few populations down there, and we're just not sure about them because we couldn't even get to them. There was so much downed trees. You know, like a forest like this is completely leveled.
Grant Blankenship: Climate change means those storms are a larger and more frequent threat. But Bowman Cutway says here in Georgia, the threats are more manageable.
Heather Bowman-Cutway: The biggest threat to their survival really is the invasive plants.
Grant Blankenship: Hence this weeding party organized by Jennifer Sesca of the Georgia Plant Conservation Alliance. Jessica says the top invasive today is a carpet of English ivy.
Jennifer Sesca: English ivy is — right? It's a misplaced plant.
Grant Blankenship: It escaped from homes at the edge of these woods. But Sesca says once, the english Ivy's pulled:
Jennifer Sesca: We're going to see plants pop out that have been waiting.
Grant Blankenship: It's landscape curation.
Jennifer Sesca: It is curation. That's a great word. We will be managing the lands for forever now.
Grant Blankenship: Just as Sesca predicted, over on the just-weeded bank of a wet weather creek, fringed campion has popped out.
Jennifer Sesca: Yeah, underneath the English ivy. That one was on top of the stump.
Grant Blankenship: It's a tiny patch of green, hugging the newly exposed red clay to the cutting of this plant will join the others and Heather Bowman Cutaway's grow house at Mercer University for safekeeping. And later on another day, more volunteers will take up curating other patches of woods for the almost 100 known rare or endangered plants in Georgia. For GPB News, I'm Grant Blankenship in Macon.
Story 7:
Peter Biello: Legislative Democrats urged Gov. Brian Kemp yesterday to accept federal funding for a program that provides low income children with free meals during the summer, when school is out. Georgia is one of a dozen states that did not participate in the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Summer EBT program this year, and it isn't planning to participate next year. Tomorrow is the deadline to commit to the program. A Kemp spokesperson says the federal programs administrative costs are too high.
Story 8:
Peter Biello: Savannah's arts news and z weekly newspaper, Connect Savannah, is ending its print and online publications. For nearly three decades, the paper served as an alternative news outlet to the city's daily paper and other media, with a heavy focus on Savannah's music, theater and arts creators. In a statement to readers published today, Connect said changing reader habits and an evolving marketing landscape have made it unable to secure the financial support to continue.
Story 9:
Peter Biello: In sports, Travis d'Arnaud homered early and hit an RBI single in the 10th inning that sent the Atlanta Braves past the San Francisco Giants, 4 to 3 last night. Ramone Laureano also went deep, and Austin Riley singled twice to lead Atlanta to its second consecutive win over San Francisco in extra innings. The Braves increased their lead to two games over the New York Mets for the final National League wild card. The two teams face off again tonight in San Francisco for the third of a four-game series.
Peter Biello: And that's all we've got for this edition of Georgia Today. We do appreciate you tuning in, and we appreciate your feedback as well. If you've got something to say about this podcast or maybe something you'd want included in itend us a note by email. The address is GeorgiaToday@GPB.org. We've got more details on the stories you heard today at the website GPB. News. It's also where you can find a photo of the fringe campion mentioned in Grant Blankenship's story. And remember, the best way to stay on top of the news in Georgia is to subscribe to this podcast. When you do, we will pop up in your feed every weekday afternoon. We aim to post every weekday at 4:30 or so. I'm Peter Biello. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you tomorrow.
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