The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Heavyweight weighs in on convention
Randy Evans, the Atlanta attorney who is on the Republican National Convention’s rules committee, has warned for weeks of a worst-case scenario at the Cleveland convention if GOPers fail to settle on a presidential nominee after the week: hotel rooms lapse, delegates leave and the Republican turmoil grows.
On Tuesday’s “Morning Edition,” Evans took it a step further when asked by WABE host Denis O’Hayer what could happen next.
“We’d have to have a backup plan,” said Evans, an attorney for both former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Gov. Nathan Deal. “We’ll start looking now at the possibilities of doing that. We may have to go to electronic voting. We may have to do something else. But I do not know.”
The July convention seems destined to become a showdown between frontrunner Donald Trump and two other contenders, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who are aiming to keep him from the 1,237 delegate threshold needed to secure the nomination.
Evans said Tuesday he expected Trump to fall about 75 to 100 delegates short of the mark, which makes the delegate-wrangling this weekend at district GOP conventions in Georgia all the more important.
The 42 delegates Trump won are bound to vote for him in the first ballot, but are free to flee the candidate for another alternative in successive rounds. Cruz’s campaign has aggressively lined up loyalists in Georgia to spurn Trump if given the chance.
His message for Trump supporters facing the prospect that their candidate may not win the nomination These are some of the many items readers could find this past week in the Political Insider blog on AJC.com. Look there for breaking news and to gain insight about Georgia’s political scene. despite a commanding delegate lead: “They just need to show up at the conventions.”
“Everybody used to think you go to the ballot box and that was the end of the day,” he added. “Right now what we know is, you go to the ballot box and you have to go to the conventions.”
Leveling playing field on public records
Georgia’s public college athletic associations now have far more time to respond to open records requests under legislation signed into law Monday by Gov. Nathan Deal despite an uproar from First Amendment advocates.
The legislation, Senate Bill 323, allows the athletic departments at UGA, Georgia Tech and other state colleges to wait 90 days before responding to Open Records Act requests. Athletic associations, like all state agencies, previously had three days to acknowledge the requests.
Deal spokeswoman Jen Talaber Ryan said the governor supported the new rules because “it simply levels the playing field with other states that also have strong athletic programs like Georgia.”
Lawmakers approved the measure after a visit by new Georgia football coach Kirby Smart, who said he was asked about it during his March sojourn to the Statehouse. It soon was tacked onto an unrelated measure and was swiftly passed after midnight on the second-to-last day of the legislative session.
Public records advocates encouraged Deal to veto the measure. Hollie Manheimer of the Georgia First Amendment Foundation called it an “affront” to Georgia’s public records laws. And David Cuillier, a University of Arizona professor who is an expert on Freedom of Information laws, said his “jaw dropped to the floor” when he saw the language.
There was little doubt that Deal would sign it, though. The exemption was added to a separate measure sought by the governor that would allow state agencies to reject records requests involving ongoing economic development projects until the deal is made public.
The legislation, which received the overwhelming support of lawmakers from both parties, exempts salary information for coaches and executives from the 90-day rule. But it would delay the release of a range of other potentially newsworthy details, including capital projects such as new facilities and recruiting spending.