SUMMARY: Kendrick Lamar is set to bring his Los Angeles hip-hop style to the Super Bowl halftime show in New Orleans, emphasizing storytelling in his performance. Fresh off winning two Grammy Awards for “Not Like Us,” Lamar aims to showcase hip-hop’s artistic depth. He becomes the first solo hip-hop artist to headline the halftime show, carrying forward the essence of rap culture. Joining him will be SZA, and the event will also feature performances from local artists like Jon Batiste and Trombone Shorty. Lamar, who recently released his acclaimed album “GNX,” is preparing for a major tour starting April 19.

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Georgia GOP-controlled Senate passes ban on trans girls from school sports teams

by Ross Williams, Georgia Recorder
February 7, 2025

The Georgia state Senate Thursday passed legislation banning transgender girls from playing on girls’ sports teams in schools along mostly party lines, and the bill’s sponsor also suggested that the body will take action to ban puberty-blocking drugs.

“The recognition of female sport is important because without a boundary around female sport that excludes male advantage, males would dominate every major sporting competition,” said sponsor Cumming Republican Sen. Greg Dolezal.

“The purpose is to include females by excluding males,” he added. “That’s part and parcel to the mere existence of female sport.”

Senate Bill 1 passed 35-17, with Democratic Sens. Freddie Powell Sims of Dawson and Ed Harbison of Columbus joining their Republican colleagues in support.

Separately, House Speaker Jon Burns held a press conference Tuesday to unveil his chamber’s plan for a ban on transgender girls playing girls’ sports.

Before either bill can become law, it will need to pass both chambers by early April, and both Burns and Lt. Gov. Burt Jones will likely be jockeying to ensure their version is the one to experience the squiggle of Gov. Brian Kemp’s bill-signing pen.

Jones and Burns may have had a chance to hash out the differences on a recent trip. Both men were in Washington Wednesday as President Donald Trump signed an executive order that also seeks to ban transgender girls from playing girls’ sports.

All the attention has not been pleasant for many trans Georgians, who call recent sports bans and other legislative and executive actions a slap in the face.

“I was crying most of yesterday because I found out that the executive order was going to happen around 24 hours before it did, and then at that point I was like, oh my gosh, between that and SB1, basically everyone was trying to keep me from playing,” said Soju Hokari, a transgender Emory University student who plays ultimate, also known as ultimate Frisbee, for the school’s gender expansive and women’s team as well as for Atlanta Soul, a local semi-professional team.

Hokari said under Trump’s executive order and the proposed state law, she could continue to play for Atlanta Soul but not at Emory. The bill would apply to interscholastic teams of all grade levels and colleges, both public colleges and private colleges that compete against public schools.

She said ultimate leagues emphasize gender inclusivity across all levels. In 2020, USA Ultimate adopted a gender inclusion policy with three divisions, men’s, women’s and mixed, but recommends that all organizers allow players to compete in whichever division they feel most comfortable with.

Hokari said the bill oversteps decisions made by leagues, which are closer to the specific needs of athletes than the state or federal government.

“I personally think that all trans athletes should just be able to play, but the leagues all have these mechanisms in place to try to have a sport-specific way of ensuring fairness and inclusion in their sports, and the problem with the law is that it’s trying to supersede that by being like, ‘actually, we know better than these individual sports.’”

Democrats called the bill a solution in search of a problem, arguing that transgender people make up less than 1% of the state’s population and an even smaller subset of transgender Georgians are student athletes.

Republicans often cite swimmer Riley Gaines, the namesake of the House bill, who became an icon for the movement against transgender participation in girls’ sports after she and other swimmers competed against and shared a locker room with a transgender woman at a 2022 championship held at Georgia Tech in Atlanta.

The NCAA changed its eligibility rules after that competition following numerous complaints.

Stone Mountain Democratic Sen. Kim Jackson offered an amendment she said would have addressed issues that are more likely to prevent girls from playing sports than transgender competitors. The bill called for measures like equalizing pay for coaches and requiring equal access to fields and equipment for girls’ and boys’ teams.

In a floor debate, Democrats said the bill could lead to challenges over cisgender female athletes who may not look conventionally feminine, or that it could require transgender boys, who may appear masculine and have bigger muscles because of testosterone injections, to play on girls’ teams.

“So then a trans boy will now compete in girls’ sports?” asked Savannah Democratic Rep. Derek Mallow.

“A trans girl – a trans boy – a female. Let’s take the trans thing off. Let’s speak to this in terms of biology, in terms of females,” Dolezal said. “Females will compete in female sport, and males will compete in male sport. I believe there are other bills that currently do address or will address the puberty blockers or even the injection of testosterone.”

“That’s not what the core of this bill discusses or contemplates,” he added. “I think we may see some downstream changes that might even change the reality or potential for what you’re talking about.”

Savannah Republican Sen. Ben Watson has filed a bill that would ban the use of puberty blockers or hormone therapy on minors.

Both versions of the transgender sports ban specify that people assigned male at birth cannot play on interscholastic teams for people assigned female at birth, but girls would be allowed to play on boys’ teams under some circumstances. They also specify that schools must maintain separate locker facilities for either gender and outline methods to complain for athletes who feel their rights have been infringed.

Frontline Policy, an influential evangelical conservative lobbying group, made an expanded transgender sports ban a top priority. Speaking after Burns’ press conference Tuesday, Frontline founder and president Cole Muzio said he’s neutral between the House and Senate bills.

“We just want girls protected in the state of Georgia, and I think the House has done a great job with this piece of legislation, very close to what we’ve advocated for,” he said. “The Senate, I know has been working hard on this, and I think there’s unity in this building between the governor’s office, the speaker of the House and the Senate. Good language is going to pass, so we’re excited to see what happens.”

Senior reporter Stanley Dunlap contributed to this report.

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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Separate Latino Days at state Capitol with dueling takes on state, national immigration crackdowns

by Stanley Dunlap, Georgia Recorder
February 5, 2025

Republican President Donald Trump’s mass deportation plans are inciting fear among immigrants throughout Georgia who are concerned about members of their communities being separated from friends, family members and coworkers.

Since the president was sworn in on Jan. 20, raids led by Immigration and Customs Enforcement are on the rise, with more than 7,300 arrests so far across the nation. Trump issued a series of immigration orders since he took office for his second term in support of his campaign promises of mass deportation and a substantial increase in border patrol security. He quickly signed the Laken Riley Act legislation, named for a Georgia nursing student slain on the University of Georgia campus by a Venezuelan national who immigration authorities say entered the country illegally.

Separate Latino Day celebrations took place at the state Capitol this week, with Georgia political factions voicing differing stances on Trump’s controversial deportation plans. The issue of immigration policy continues to simmer in the Georgia Legislature, with several immigration-related bills filed since the session started in mid-January.

Daniela Rodriguez, executive director of Migrant Equity Southeast, spoke about the challenges faced by Latino communities, including fear of ICE raids and other immigration crackdowns she says are unfair. She was one of the guest speakers at Wednesday’s third annual Latino Day event at the state Capitol organized by the Latino Community Fund Georgia, the Georgia Association of Latino Elected Officials and 14 local organizations.

“These past few days have been tough and heavy. Even with all the preparation, the fear and worry in our immigrant communities feels very real,” Rodriguez said. “Mothers are scared of being separated from their children, families are living in fear of ICE raids and unfair policies. This isn’t just upsetting. This is wrong. No one should have to live in fear.”

Rodriguez praised the resilience of Latinos in America in defending their rights. She urged a united front in the fight against sanctuary city laws and other policies discriminating against Latinos.

“This isn’t the first time they’re coming to attack us, and just like we’ve done it before, we will stand up and we will fight back,” Rodriguez said. “Hope isn’t just a feeling. Hope is a call to action. And I will continue to have hope, hope that this reality won’t define our future. Hope that together, we will rise above these challenges.”

A day earlier, Loganville Republican Rep. Rey Martinez hosted a press conference for Latino Day featuring speakers from conservative organizations like Libre Initiative.

He said he has compassion for Latinos who are scared of being removed from their communities, but the Trump administration is going after criminals, whether they’re violent gang members or immigrants lacking permanent legal status.

“They want to get rid of the bad apples first,” Martinez said. “They want to get rid of, first, people who are here illegally, because obviously they broke the law.”

There are reports that immigrants without permanent legal status are being detained in metro Atlanta, leaving some people, even legal immigrants, confused.

Jefferson Dominguez, a board member with the Hispanic Construction Association, said he supported Trump’s immigration plan, but was concerned about the large number of his employees afraid of coming to work despite being legally in the country.

“Whoever is working here with respect, paying taxes, and to do great things for this country should stay,” Dominguez said Tuesday inside the Capitol. “We just want to get out the bad people that came here to do bad things. We don’t want the bad people.”

In Georgia, Republican lawmakers are pushing legislation that would stiffen penalties for local government officials and employees who do not report immigrants without permanent legal status to federal authorities.

A state Senate committee hearing was held Wednesday for Senate Bill 21, which would allow for local government officials and employees in so-called sanctuary cities to be held criminally and civilly liable for crimes committed by immigrants without permanent legal status. The bill advanced out of committee and is now eligible for a vote by the full Senate.

In 2024, Gov. Brian Kemp signed legislation requiring law enforcement to notify federal authorities when undocumented immigrants are arrested in Georgia. Under the state’s new immigration law, local governments are subject to losing state funding and police and local officials may face misdemeanor charges for failing to enforce federal immigration laws.

It is not just immigrants without permanent legal status who are targeted by Trump’s orders. The Trump administration terminated humanitarian  protections that allowed thousands of Venezuelans to work legally in the U.S.

State Sen. RaShaun Kemp criticized Trump and other Republicans for supporting mass deportations and making insensitive remarks about migrants on Wednesday.

“As an Afro-Latino citizen, I have to say that this country that I love, I’m pretty disgusted to see what Donald Trump is doing up in DC,” said the Atlanta Democrat at Wednesday’s Latino Day event in Liberty Plaza. “He’s going out of his way to hurt and scare our community. He said when he first came down that escalator, that immigrants bring drugs and crime, but I say immigrants bring opportunity and growth.”

Growing Latino influence in Georgia

Dueling Latino Days at the Georgia capitol this week provided Latino and Hispanic organizations and government officials with a chance to celebrate the accomplishments of 1.1 million residents in Georgia, including 91,000 Latino-owned businesses. Attendees at both Latino Days stressed that the overwhelming majority of people with Hispanic and Latino heritage are hardworking people who care about their communities and families.

On Tuesday, conservative Latino organizations celebrated the accomplishments of Latinos and the growing electorate that led to Trump winning 35% of their votes in 2024.

“In 2024 in Georgia, Hispanics made their voices heard in record numbers,” Martinez said. “There are 498,000 registered Hispanics in the state of Georgia. Out of that 262,000 voted in 2024. That’s a record number, and I owe it to all these folks for doing the hard work.”

According to Gigi Pedraza, Executive Director of Latino Community Fund Georgia, 55% of Latinos own homes and have a higher employment rate than other racial and ethnic groups.

“Latinos and immigrants have been intrinsically connected to the successes of Georgia as a state,” Pedraza said Wednesday. “Our community has and continues to lead in workforce participation, entrepreneurship and innovation across all sectors, regardless of documentation status, faith, race, ethnicity, gender, place of birth, and who we love.”

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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