The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Limited policy impact
Had Hillary Clinton swept the election, a raft of legislation aimed at curtailing her executive actions and legislative priorities would surely be pending on Gov. Nathan Deal’s desk.
For one, it would have ensured the survival of the Affordable Care Act and reignited debate about whether the state should expand the Medicaid program. Instead, Trump’s victory has for now extinguished serious talk of enlarging the program.
Deal urged Georgians to “caution against taking giant leaps on health care policy” until Trump and Congress hash out what they’ll do. And he warned against making vast changes to the tax code that he said could “jeopardize” the state’s fiscal health.
With one health overhaul already on the trash heap and only an outline for sweeping tax changes, there’s no telling when that would be.
White House officials say that Trump has been one of the most productive presidents of the modern era, and they point to the roughly 30 executive orders he’s signed to date. Those actions have touched on everything from Chinese steel dumping to national monument designations.
The pace has been dizzying, and supporters say it’s prompted a new sense of optimism in Georgia and beyond. U.S. Sen. David Perdue, one of Trump’s top allies in the state, said residents “are beginning to see a president who is moving at a business pace and not a bureaucratic pace, not a Washington pace.”
Those executive orders, though, have largely had a limited impact in Georgia, since most are targeted at the business conducted by federal agencies. The legislation Congress has sent to Trump’s desk has also been relatively narrow in scope since Senate Democrats have stonewalled the GOP’s most sweeping proposals.
That’s led to a muted Trump impact on Georgia policy.
A bill Trump signed earlier this month would allow states to block funding for Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers; Georgia has long withheld state funding for the groups.
Trump’s administration has threatened to restrict federal funding for cities that declare themselves “sanctuaries” and don’t report immigrants living here illegally; the mayors of Atlanta and other Democratic-led cities have refused such a designation. A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked the order from going into effect.
That’s also been the legal fate of one of Trump’s signature policy proposals — a pause in admitting Middle Eastern refugees. Thousands congregated outside Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport to protest the president’s move to institute the ban in January, and it’s since been blocked in court.
Where Congress’ Republican majority has been able to make its voice heard the most is through special legislation nullifying leftover Obama-era regulations. Trump has signed a record 13 of them since January.
Junior Republican lawmakers, including several from Georgia, said they feel more included and part of the White House’s decision-making process than ever before; one of the first bills Trump signed into law was authored by U.S. Rep. Buddy Carter of Pooler.
And Republicans cheered Trump’s quick response to a pair of disasters that struck Georgia after his inauguration. Trump called Deal and secured a federal disaster declaration after a deadly wave of tornadoes struck the state in January. And he approved $10 million in emergency funding to help repair a portion of the I-85 bridge that collapsed in March.
But many of the regulatory overhauls Trump has pushed, such as scaling back an Environmental Protection Agency rule that expands federal oversight of the nation’s wetlands and waterways, could take years of court battles and public hearings to implement.