By Jill Nolin | Editor
A controversial new state law that almost didn’t survive the legislative process earlier this year now faces a new challenge: the courts. The law makes the district attorney’s seat and some other county offices nonpartisan, but only in five left-leaning metro Atlanta counties. Notably, sheriffs’ offices are still partisan roles under the new law.
The lawsuit challenging Georgia's nonpartisan DA law is being heard by Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thomas A. Cox. Maya Homan/Georgia Recorder
COURTS
By Maya Homan
The fate of a Georgia law that will make the district attorney’s seat and other roles nonpartisan in five metro Atlanta counties rests in the hands of a Fulton County judge after two district attorneys filed lawsuits challenging the measure.
Lawyers for the state of Georgia are urging a Fulton County judge to dismiss one of the challenges.
The measure was passed along party lines and signed into law by Gov. Brian Kemp earlier this year. It applies to positions like district attorney, county clerk and tax commissioner starting in 2028 — but only in counties that have a medical examiner rather than an elected coroner.
A pine forest covers the future site of the OpenAI data center at the Savannah Gateway Industrial Hub in Effingham County on July 27, 2026. The $20 billion project was announced last week, surprising many local residents. Credit: Justin Taylor/The Current GA/CatchLight/Report for America
DATA CENTERS
By Maggie Lee, The Current
A group of plaintiffs is asking a judge to declare that the Effingham County Industrial Development Authority unfairly did public business in private and to throw out the agency’s deals with OpenAI affiliate Octans Georgia for a data center near Rincon.
Five county residents plus the nonprofit environmental group One Hundred Miles allege that the county development authority didn’t provide proper notice or a meaningful agenda for the key July board vote that bound the community’s land to the maker of ChatGPT software and granted the company a 50% property tax break.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, is urging President Donald Trump to embargo diesel fuel exports as rising costs impact farmers in his largely agricultural state. Grassley is shown at a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting on July 23, 2026. (Screenshot from committee webcast)
DC BUREAU
By Ashley Murray
Diesel prices hit a record average of $6.51 a gallon Monday, and some in President Donald Trump’s own party are breaking their support for the ongoing war in Iran that has driven fuel prices to staggering levels in the United States and across the globe.
Already House Republicans locked in tight races as the November midterms approach have distanced themselves from the president’s conflict and his administration’s stagnant negotiations with Iran over reopening the Strait of Hormuz, a vital passage for global petroleum products. Another major vote on Iran support is expected later this week in the U.S. Senate.
The cost of diesel, which fuels the movement of goods through the United States, is up nearly $1 since last month, and up from just over $3.69 a year ago, according to AAA.
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