In the final hours of its 2022 session, Georgia's General Assembly pivoted from celebrating a towering bipartisan mental health overhaul to bitterly debating Republican efforts to ban transgender girls from playing sports — one of many about-faces in a year when the GOP is squarely focused on upcoming election primaries.
Driving the dynamic was the need for Republican Gov. Brian Kemp to shore up his conservative credentials against a challenge from former U.S. Sen. David Perdue, as well other lawmakers' bids for statewide office.
