After both parties (mostly) picked their candidate teams this week, Democrats were quick to make a pitch as the party of jobs in a business-friendly Georgia. And Republicans talked about jobs too, but the GOP kicked off its unified campaigning with a rally heavy on conservative values.

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Abrams stopped by an Atlanta bakery and cafe on Friday on a three-day “jobs tour” with stops in Savannah and Macon.

At a press conference outside Bread & Butterfly, Abrams laid out some small-business planks in her platform, including the promise of a fund worth $10 million annually for small-business financing.

She said Georgia has made good progress, but that progress hasn’t reached all communities. Part of her answer to that? Make sure small businesses all over the state can get access to capital and that Georgia’s full of ready-to-hire folks who have skills from baking to ironworking to film production.

Read more: https://saportareport.com/georgia-candidates-start-new-round-of-campaigning-with-talk-of-jobs-values/


Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams speaks with supporters after an Atlanta press conference on Friday. Credit: Maggie Lee

As part of a larger effort to reach the Hispanic voting population, Charleston County Democrats have launched a new Spanish website.

The page, charlestondemocrats.com/espanol, is not a Spanish version of the local party’s current website but is more specific.

County party Chairman Brady Quirk-Garvan said the focus is on making sure voters, whether they speak English or Spanish, know about the party and its candidates.

“The Spanish-speaking population is growing both in Charleston County and in the state as a whole,” he said.

Read more: https://www.postandcourier.com/politics/palmetto-politics-charleston-dems-launching-first-ever-hispanic-voter-outreach/article_48a6a0a8-90d9-11e8-a4c5-f34294c2c45f.html

The former finance manager for one of the Southeast’s largest corporate event production firms was sentenced to five years in prison Monday for siphoning off more than $800,000 from the company.

“I’m just incredibly sorry for having done something so stupid,” John Scott Jarrett of Summerville told U.S. District Court Judge Gergel before he was sentenced for wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.

Jarrett pleaded guilty to the charges in exchange for a reduced sentence. The maximum for wire fraud was 20 years, with an additional two years for the aggravated identity theft.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Rhett DeHart asked Gergel not to go below the recommended sentencing guidelines.

Read more: https://www.postandcourier.com/business/embezzlement-in-north-charleston-nets--year-behind-bars/article_8495a52e-9407-11e8-abee-5fd1220d1ddb.html

COLUMBIA, SC -- Planned Parenthood South Atlantic and a patient filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court on Friday asking a judge to reverse Gov. Henry McMaster’s July order that booted the health care provider from the state’s Medicaid provider network.

The suit was filed against Joshua Baker, head of the S.C. Department of Health and Human Services, the agency that oversees the state’s Medicaid program.

In a statement, Planned Parenthood South Atlantic said the July 13 order has forced Planned Parenthood to cease providing health care services to S.C. Medicaid patients. Planned Parenthood has clinics in Columbia and Charleston.

McMaster’s order terminated Planned Parenthood’s ability to seek Medicaid reimbursements for providing health care services — for example, birth control and testing for sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV — to the state’s poorest women and men.

Read more: https://www.thestate.com/latest-news/article215680615.html

COLUMBIA, S.C. -- While charging its customers $37 million a month for a failed multibillion-dollar nuclear project, top executives at a South Carolina utility set aside $110 million in an irrevocable trust to pay themselves bonuses for aiding their utility’s sale.

The revelation came Monday during a hearing a on SCE&G’s motion to block a 15-percent temporary rate cut enacted by state lawmakers.

Attorney Matthew Richardson, who is representing Senate President Pro Tempore Hugh Leatherman, pointed to SEC filings disclosing the trust, which he argued was “meant to protect SCANA execs with golden parachutes.”

Asked about the trust, SCANA Chief Financial Officer Iris Griffin said the money was meant to provide merger-related compensation to unnamed utility leaders who would lose their jobs after Virginia-based Dominion Energy buys SCE&G parent company, Cayce-based SCANA.

Read more: https://www.thestate.com/news/politics-government/article215809595.html

A former sheriff’s deputy who was working as a school resource officer at a South Carolina high school recently pleaded guilty to having a sexual relationship with one of the students, according to a prosecutor.

Donald Eugene Henry Jr. was a deputy with the Aiken County Sheriff’s Office and was working as an SRO at Midland Valley High School in February 2017 when he was arrested, said Heather Deloach, an assistant solicitor with the 2nd Circuit solicitor’s office.

According to the Aiken County School District, Henry worked as an SRO since 2005, only taking off time because of a “military deployment,” WRDW reported.

Jail records show the now 57-year-old Aiken resident was charged with sexual battery upon a student 16 or 17 years of age, no aggravated force or coercion.

Read more: https://www.thestate.com/news/local/crime/article215788180.html

A South Carolina speech therapist could be sentenced to more than 30 years behind bars after being convicted of healthcare fraud, that included bogus claims of speech therapy for dead people, according to the U.S. Attorney’s office.

Gena Randolph was convicted in federal court for a scheme where she stole $2 million from federal health care programs, according to a media release from U.S. Attorney Sherri A. Lydon.

This is not the first time the 44-year-old Mount Pleasant woman has been in trouble with the law.

According to jail records at the Al Cannon Detention Center, Randolph was arrested on a computer crime act charge in 2015. That crime exceeded $10,000, but the charge was dropped, according to court records, postandcourier.com reported.

Read more: https://www.thestate.com/news/local/crime/article215807455.html

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — Shareholders of South Carolina utility SCANA are expected to vote Tuesday on whether to merge with Virginia-based Dominion Energy.

SCANA suddenly needed a buyer after spending billions of dollars on a pair of nuclear reactors that were abandoned a year ago. Dominion is offering more than $1 billion in rebates, but is also pushing against rate cuts that a number of South Carolina lawmakers want to see offered.

If approved by regulators, the deal would also cut rates for customers of SCANA subsidiary South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. by about 5 percent.

SCANA has been reeling since announcing last summer SCE&G was abandoning construction of two new reactors at the V.C. Summer Nuclear Station. Thousands were left jobless in the wake of the $9 billion failure.

https://www.scnow.com/news/state/wire/article_1c467601-aac6-5bdf-9a48-e6a5c0d670b4.html
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Another S.C. politician has been tricked into appearing on Sacha Baron Cohen’s satirical comedy show.

Former state Rep. Chip Limehouse (R) appeared on Sunday’s episode of the Showtime series “Who Is America” in what was billed as a discussion of race with Atlanta rapper Bone Crusher.

The discussion was moderated by Cohen in the guise of Dr. Nira Cain-N’Degeocello, a “liberal, NPR-loving character,” according to a Hollywood Reporter recap.

Cohen’s character spent the segment asking the two men bizarre questions. He told the rapper that “black” was an offensive word, asked the men about their favorite scene in the film “Moonlight” — a coming-of-age film about a gay African-American man — and talked about rapper Will Smith being from Compton (he’s not).

Read more: https://www.thestate.com/news/politics-government/article215757540.html

Survivors of the mass shooting at a Florida high school that left 17 dead will co-host a town hall with local student activists Tuesday night at the College of Charleston.

The town hall will begin at 7 p.m. at Sottile Theatre as part of the Parkland survivors' Road to Change tour, which stopped in 18 different cities in June.

"Join us to help get people registered and ready to vote!" reads an email by Jammal Lemy, an activist and former student at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. "We'll talk about how we can rally voters around saving lives this November and stand up to the NRA."

Sixteen more cities are on the books between Sat. July 28 and Aug. 12, starting with a call for stricter gun legislation in Florida's capital and continuing through Atlanta; Roswell, Ga.; and Charleston.

Read more: https://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/TheBattery/archives/2018/07/27/parkland-shooting-survivors-will-host-a-town-hall-tuesday-at-the-college-of-charleston