By Jack Bernard, contributing columnist
PEACHTREE CITY, GA. | It is a fact, not a theory, that Trump lost the vote in Georgia to Joe Biden by 11,779 votes. But you would never know that if you listened to MAGA apologists like Georgia Lt. Governor Burt Jones.
As a state senator, Burt Jones was one of the “false electors” attempting to unconstitutionally overthrow the November 2020 presidential election, which courts have repeatedly found to be fair and honest. Jones wanted a special legislative session held to reverse the 2020 election… an action which Governor Brian Kemp, Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and other GOP officials rejected as unconstitutional.
Jones was subsequently elected Georgia’s lieutenant governor in 2022, which would have never happened except for the botching of the prosecution of the case against him. Per the judge reviewing the case — “The optics are horrific.”
Specifically, Jones and 15 others would have almost certainly been convicted of election interference except for the disgraceful incompetence of Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis. She held multiple fundraisers for Charlie Bailey, Jones’ Democratic opponent, so she was excused from the Jones case in 2022. That effectively ended the prosecution of Jones.
Further, Willis appointed a boyfriend as prosecutor, which caused her to be removed from the broader case. Special Prosecutor Pete Skandalakis, a state official and a Republican, was then appointed. Inexplicably, Skandalakis asked the court to have the case terminated. Even though a number of the fake electors had already pleaded guilty, and Skandalakis appeared to indicate that the plot was illegal, the entire case was dismissed in late 2025.
Back to Jones who has a number of other ethical issues, brought to light by the shadowy group “Georgians for Integrity.” If you go to their web site, you find nothing to explain where their funding comes from. You simply see an advertisement accusing Jones of A. trying to raise his state pension a. by 40 percent and B. pulling strings to get a Data Center built on his family’s land. Speculation is that wealthy outsider Rick Jackson is the force behind this advertising group and the Georgia Republican Party filed an ethics complaint against them.
Other ads go after Jones for pushing legislation (Senate Bill 99) designed to gut the state’s regulatory Certificate of Needs (CON) laws to get permission for his family to construct an unneeded hospital in Butts County. As a former Georgia director of Health Planning, I believe this charge to have merit. The demographics of Butts County would have caused the state CON authority to refuse to approve a totally unneeded facility.
As for the issues, Jones also parrots the MAGA line. For example, slash taxes (“4.99 percent terminal income tax by 2027” ), while never mentioning the fact that Georgia has one of the highest bankruptcy rates in the USA due to the state’s refusal to fund Medicaid expansion. However, Georgia voters rank healthcare as one of their most important issues, second only to the economy.
Plus, Jones addresses another “major problem:” preventing trans kids from participating in girls’ sports. It should be noted that there are currently virtually no trans kids in high school sports.
He also cites his support for the “Georgia Promise Scholarship”, which gives $6,500 tuition supplements to students looking to go to private k-12 schools. The problem is that tuition costs double that amount, so only upper middle class parents can take advantage of it. Plus, pushing private school guts support for our public school system.
The one thing Jones has going for him is the Trump endorsement, key to 47 percent of GOP voters.
- Have a comment? Click here to send an email.
