The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Fulton’s literacy coaches leveling up reading scores
When the timer rings in Erika Jobbers’ kindergarten classroom, her students know exactly what to do. They get up and head to their assigned stations. Small groups form around the room. Some work on writing letters. Another group works with Jobbers on...
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Convicted rapist heads to prison for life
The woman whose face was beamed onto a TV screen at the front of a Dekalb County courtroom had waited 13 years for justice. She spoke confidently and clearly as she read from her statement to the court via Zoom, explaining what Wesley Cooley stole...
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Andrew Young at 94: The last voice in the room
On Monday, Andrew Young was doing what he does best — being Andrew Young. About an hour before he was scheduled to take the stage at the Buckhead Theatre to record Coleman Hughes’ podcast alongside Martin Luther King Jr. biographer Jonathan Eig, Young...
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Runoff is set to decide who will replace Greene in U.S. House
Democrat Shawn Harris and Republican Clayton Fuller were headed toward a runoff Tuesday night in the special election to succeed U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, setting up the matchup the White House and many state GOP leaders had hoped would emerge...
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Storms, staffing issues snarl weekend at airport
Hartsfield-jackson Atlanta International Airport had a rough weekend. Passengers saw long security lines Sunday and Monday morning, as Transportation Security Administration officers entered their fourth week of working without pay during a partial...
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ICE Academy ‘deficient, defective and broken’
Ryan Schwank’s fears began the day he reported for work as a constitutional law instructor at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Academy in Brunswick. First, he says, he heard a discussion among staffers about poorly done background checks on new...
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THE VANISHINGS NO ONE NOTICED
o one knows how long they’ve been disappearing. But vanish they have, again and again, without a trace. The crime scenes dot stretches of Georgia’s rolling, red-clay Piedmont from U.S. 129, the busiest route between Athens and Macon, on up beyond the...
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Retailer tees up for Atlanta mulligan
Troy Rice, like most golfers, says few things are more disheartening than slicing the ball on a swing that feels good. Instead of gracefully gliding toward the green, a slice causes the ball to go wide of the target. So when Rice, the newly appointed...
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Atlanta’s ICE field office exceeds detention limits
José Manuel “David” Gómez had been living in Georgia for more than 20 years when he was arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement while en route to an air conditioner repair job. The June arrest took place in Banks County, roughly 80 miles...
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Apalachee shooting suspect’s dad convicted
WINDER — Colin Gray, father of the teen accused of killing four and injuring nine others in a September 2024 shooting at Apalachee High School, became at least the third parent in the U.S. to be convicted on charges related to their child’s alleged...
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Take a stroll through aviation history at airport
The walls along the hallway between Atlanta’s Concourses D and E had always been forgettable. Now, they’re hard to miss. A new permanent exhibit, “Blue Skies: 100 Years of the Atlanta Airport,” opened there Thursday, and the space is suddenly packed...
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U.S. and Israel continue to pound targets in Iran
President Donald Trump signals a willingness to talk to new leadership after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s death, but Iran has vowed revenge, firing missiles at Israel and Gulf Arab states in a counteroffensive that resulted in the deaths of...
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TRUMP: IRAN’S ‘EVIL’ SUPREME LEADER KILLED
DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES — A major attack launched by Israel and the United States killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Donald Trump said Saturday, announcing an assassination that he said gave Iranians their “greatest...
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Colin Gray: Gun gift was attempt to bond
WINDER — Colin Gray described himself as a dad who wanted to make it work. His family was in flux, estranged from his wife, Marcee, who had addiction-related issues and moved out in 2022 with their two younger children amid arguments and financial...
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Sentence is 5 years in 5-year-old’s death
She had killed a 5-year-old boy without meaning to, and Michelle Wierson felt remorse. Wierson wrote letters to the victim’s family, but she couldn’t send them because of a no-contact order. And so, said a friend, the Rev. Kara Russell, Wierson tried...
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State remembers its first group of Black lawmakers
In 1868, 33 Black men were elected to Georgia’s General Assembly in the violent aftermath of the Civil War. Within months, white lawmakers expelled them. On Wednesday, their successors publicly honored them. At a Capitol ceremony highlighting the...
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State of the Union: Trump calls this `golden age of America'
President Donald Trump declared that “this is the golden age of America” during his State of the Union address Tuesday night to a joint session of Congress. “Our nation is back — bigger, better, richer and stronger than ever before,” he said. For more...
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Mom: Colt Gray thought teachers were out to get him
In the days leading up to the shooting at Apalachee High School, alleged shooter Colt Gray thought his teachers were out to get him and he was scared, his mother testified Monday. On the stand for the second week of the trial of Colt’s father, her...
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French company makes $140M bet on metro roof shingles factory
PEACHTREE CITY — Every minute, a new pallet of roof shingles rolls off assembly lines in this cavernous factory south of Atlanta. After a multiyear and $140 million expansion, the Saint-gobain plant doubled its capacity, and is now capable of churning...
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Two Georgia families forever connected by D.C. midair collision
The National Transportation Safety Board this week published its final report about the causes of the fatal airplane and helicopter collision in Washington, D.C., in January a year ago. But for two coastal Georgia families, it marked only a chapter in...
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Border Patrol recruiters stir protest at Georgia college job fairs
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials recently visited several Georgia college campuses, not to detain immigrants, but to recruit students. Their presence triggered some criticism, including at the University of Georgia, where students held a...
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Trump’s visit tests his grip on Georgia
ROME — President Donald Trump returned to Georgia on Thursday for the first time since reclaiming the White House, revisiting the grievance that has defined his relationship with the state for much of the decade: his 2020 defeat. In a nearly 80-minute...
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She tried to save her daughter. A son died.
As the Volkswagen hurtled toward the Toyota, going roughly 50 mph on a residential street in Decatur, witnesses noticed something strange. It did not slow down. The driver never seemed to hit the brakes. The Toyota was stopped at a traffic light....
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JESSE 1941-2026 JACKSON
Contemporary of Martin Luther King Jr. twice ran for president, famously championed an all-inclusive ‘Rainbow Coalition.’ The Rev. Jesse Jackson, whose impassioned oratory and populist vision of a ‘rainbow coalition’ of the poor and forgotten made him...
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Apalachee suspect obsessed with Parkland
Before he carried out the deadliest school shooting in Georgia history at Apalachee High School, Colt Gray obsessively studied school shooters and even sent money to the person convicted of the mass shooting in Parkland, Florida, attorneys revealed to...
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69% of metro Atlanta homes sold below asking price in 2025
Metro Atlanta homes sold at a discount last year at the highest rate in a decade, another sign the market has tilted in favor of buyers. In 2025, almost 69% of buyers bought homes below the original list price — the highest share since 2015. That’s...
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The story behind ‘Theo of Golden’ and its Georgia author
About seven years ago in this riverside city, a man walked into a coffee shop. He saw portraits on the walls. And he had the idea that would make him a bestselling novelist. ‘Theo of Golden’ was self-published in 2023. It was picked up last year by an...
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Possible Dekalb school closures may spark exodus
Matt Totten lives close enough to Vanderlyn Elementary and Dunwoody High that he can hear the football team and marching band practice in the summer and can walk his two oldest kids to class every day. The proximity to those schools is part of why his...
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One year later, fired CDC workers keep on fighting
One year ago this week, hundreds of workers at the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention watched their email accounts on Friday afternoon, having been told termination notices would go out then. Nothing arrived that day, or that...
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Georgia 1776: The miracle of Americas newest colony
Delivering a politically charged toast in a public tavern these days can elicit groans, shunning and perhaps even a “You want to step outside?” challenge. In Savannah circa 1775, recrimination stretched beyond such civilized bounds. When riverboat...
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Raid’s unsealed documents show FBI relied on skeptics
The FBI cited a slew of allegations that have already been investigated to justify the seizure of Fulton County’s 2020 ballots, an affidavit unsealed Tuesday shows. The document shows the agency interviewed numerous people who have suggested the...
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He persuaded Delta to lend him a Boeing 757
[email protected] As a child, John Bailey would gaze up at the model airplanes hanging overhead in his bedroom. “I loved airplanes,” said Bailey, now 80 years old. “But I had no idea about becoming a pilot.” It wasn’t until college in the...
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10,000 gallons of fuel spilled into Flint River
Friday’s jet fuel spill at the Atlanta airport released an estimated 10,000 gallons from a fuel pipeline into the stormwater system and the Flint River, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said Tuesday. That figure is nearly eight times larger...
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Police body cam footage shows chaos at FBI raid
In the chaotic early moments of the FBI’S raid of Fulton County offices, it seemed no one in county government knew who to trust — or what exactly was going on. The confusion was captured on body cameras worn by Fulton County police officers as they...
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Motherhood fuels Georgia woman’s fifth Olympic run
Elana Meyers Taylor is no stranger to adversity. The U.S. Olympic bobsledder was forced to adjust after her pilot pulled a hamstring in Vancouver during the 2010 Winter Games, and four years later her sled broke in Sochi. She tore her Achilles tendon...
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Gwinnett officer, 25, fatally shot on duty
A 25-year-old Gwinnett County police officer died Sunday morning after being attacked while responding to a call, the agency said. Officer Pradeep Tamang, a native of Nepal, had been with the department less than a year, Chief J.D. Mcclure said Sunday...
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Snow for some turns into bitter cold for all
Snow turned into bitter cold Saturday night across North Georgia, including metro Atlanta. Just lastweekend, Georgianswere forced to hunker down at home because of wintry weather. This time around, though, you could step outside and make a snow angel...
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'Nobody deserves this ... no huma is illegal
The 15-year-olds who organized an after-school, anti-ice protest at Snellville’s Brookwood High on Wednesday afternoon had no idea that hundreds of their classmates would attend. Actually, when sophomore Nusaibah Khan posted a flyer about their plan...
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Officials scramble for details after FBI raid
Fulton County officials defended their handling of the 2020 election after FBI agents seized hundreds of boxes of voting records as part of a criminal investigation. Striking a defiant tone, officials said Thursday they were prepared for possible...
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FBI raids election office in Fulton County
The FBI raided Fulton County’s election operations center Wednesday, an action apparently connected to the Trump administration’s long-held, but unproven, belief that Fulton’s handling of the 2020 presidential election was rife with fraud. Reached by...
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Board created to deliver Stitch to downtown
Capping one of the country’s busiest interstate corridors with an elevated park is a tall task, but a group of Atlanta leaders aims to rise to the challenge. The formation of a nonprofit was announced Tuesday to helm the Stitch project, an effort to...
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Dangerous temps will linger
Frigid cold air is here to stay for at least the next several days even though a weekend storm that caused power outages and canceled school is behind us. North Georgia’s daytime highs, including in metro Atlanta, are projected to hover around the...
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Outages reach 100,000 as ‘dangerously cold’ temps continue
A massive winter storm dumped sleet, freezing rain and snow across much of the U.S. on Sunday, bringing subzero temperatures and halting air and road traffic. Tree branches and power lines snapped under the weight of ice, and hundreds of thousands of...
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Georgians make final preparations for ice storm
Georgians spent Saturday preparing to hunker down, readying themselves in the final hours of calm before a storm that is expected to bring significant ice and potentially dayslong power outages to large parts of the state. Light frozen rain started...
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Brace for ice, wind, power outages
Much of metro Atlanta is now included in an ice storm warning that extends into the rest of North Georgia as the state braces for treacherous winter weather arriving this weekend. It’s the first time an ice storm warning has been issued in Georgia in...
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Ready or not, the cold is coming
Imagine the Titanic if it were measured in salt. The ocean liner’s hull weighed 26,000 tons, a total slightly less than the amount of salt used by the Georgia Department of Transportation to keep roads clear of snow and ice last year. All that salt...
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For the first time since 2019, Atlanta homicides fall below 100
Santos Wyatt loved two things more than anything: his young son and working on cars. After a long weekend of work in July 2025, Wyatt went to Atlanta’s Sweet Auburn neighborhood to hang out. He never made it home. Wyatt was killed in a shooting that...
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Georgia colleges see more employee departures after return-to-office mandate
Some of Georgia’s largest public universities saw a significant uptick in employee resignations last year, shortly after the University System of Georgia announced a “return-to-office” mandate. From July to mid-october, there was an increase in...
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Atlanta airport looks to stay ahead now and in the future
One hundred years ago, when Atlanta built its airport, city leaders had high hopes it would quickly become a top air hub. Already in the airport’s second year, city council debated spending $50,000 on lights to allow overnight flying — to keep ahead...
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Teen fighting cancer gets a football title game trip
Fourteen-year-old Burke Bowie has been fifighting cancer longer than he’s been watching football. Both have led him on trips of a lifetime. After 10 years of battling neuroblastoma, a cancer that starts in immature nerve tissue, and another year...
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‘Fiscal restraint’ part of Kemp’s priorities
Gov. Brian Kemp on Thursday unveiled plans to put more than $2 billion back in the pockets of taxpayers through tax cuts and rebates. If approved by the General Assembly, the tax relief and budget proposals would cement Kemp’s legacy of returning...
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Kemp proposes $2B in highway expansions
Gov. Brian Kemp rolled out a sweeping infrastructure proposal Wednesday anchored by multibillion-dollar improvements to some of Georgia’s most congested highways, new rural roadwork and a $50 million initiative addressing homelessness. Kemp revealed...
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Welcome back, Georgia Legislature
The state’s lawmakers returned to Atlanta on Monday to kick off the second year of the two-year legislative session. Hundreds of bills that didn’t cross the finish line last year remain in play, including a change to how school speeding zone cameras...
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DATA CENTER FRENZY RAISES COMPETITION FOR DEVELOPMENT SITES
Real estate is expected to appreciate in value, but it’s rare to see a property’s price quadruple in only three years. But that’s exactly what happened in Alpharetta for an aging data center formerly used by BlackBerry. The 16-year-old facility at...
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Shutdown is a ‘cold dose of reality’ for public media
After more than five decades of helping fund public radio and television stations in Atlanta and across the nation, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting’s board of directors has voted to dissolve the organization. The finality of the decision,...
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Atlanta mayor shares his vision at inauguration
Mayor Andre Dickens was sworn in to office for a second term Monday, along with all members of the Atlanta City Council. Thousands of people crowded into Georgia State University’s Convocation Hall for the inauguration ceremony — including top...
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Venezuelans in Atlanta imagine post-maduro life
Andrea Paiva was brought to tears Saturday morning as she caught up on overnight messages from loved ones informing her that Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife had been captured in a U.S. operation. The 32-year-old, who moved to metro...
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U.S TO 'RUN' VENEZUELA AND CONTROL ITS OIL
CARACAS, VENEZUELA — Hours after an audacious military operation that plucked leader Nicolás Maduro from power and removed him from the country, President Donald Trump said Saturday that the United States would run Venezuela at least temporarily and...
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‘We’re trying to get them to see that they can do it’
Krista Sanders’ Advanced Placement Calculus students at Atlanta’s Mays High School have their eyes set on a big graph displayed at the front of the classroom. Sanders has drawn a line on the graph that has two slopes. She asks her class to identify the...
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Will suburban voters ever support transit expansion?
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens sees expanding MARTA into Cobb and Gwinnett counties as a key step toward better regional connection, while metro Atlanta residents continue to struggle with traffic congestion that’s both frustrating and dangerous. But his...
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2026 could again reshape Georgia's political identity
It was supposed to be a quieter year in Georgia politics — a pause between election cycles, a chance for both parties to regroup before the 2026 onslaught. Instead, 2025 became a prelude to what is sure to be a political tempest. President Donald...
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'They're just humble folks trying to bring awareness to peace'
Amanda Furgason first became familiar with Buddhism when she was around 12 or 13, after becoming disillusioned with her experiences in the Southern Baptist church. So when she learned a group of Buddhist monks who are walking to promote peace would be...
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Carter Center navigates politics a year after namesake's death
Carter Center CEO Paige Alexander remembers her Atlanta nonprofit still was grieving the loss of its namesake at the beginning of this year when it was faced with a new challenge to its mission of advancing health, human rights and peace around the...
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Coke's first ad appeared in its hometown paper
Hometown Coca-Cola has long been a marketing behemoth, from Super Bowl spots to its iconic holiday ads featuring Santa Claus and precocious polar bears. But Coca-Cola’s first advertisement was far more modest, about the size of a pair of postage...
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East Lake mural honors beloved community leader
For muralist Chastain “Chaz” Clark, brick is not just a blank canvas. He uses brick to tell a story about Atlanta, the city he grew up in. It’s a story about history, identity and power. “Bricks are important for a lot of reasons in Atlanta and in...
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Why Kwanzaaa still matters
In 1981, Kenneth Zakee was grieving. His mother, Marjorie Hardaway, had died earlier that year, and the holidays arrived carrying more absence than comfort. Christmas, once anchored by the familiar rhythms of his mother and sister in the kitchen,...
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'This, once it's all set up and wired up, is magical'
As Christmas curb appeal goes, Don Mathis’ house won’t appear on ‘The Great Christmas Light Fight’ anytime soon. The white lights twinkling from the roofline, shrubbery and a set of wire reindeer in the yard suggest a measured Yuletide gaiety. But the...
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God's Acre reveals complex Cherokee history
SPRING PLACE — Near the edge of this tiny North Georgia community lies a grassy field topped with rustic split-rail fences and weathered gray stone monuments. Called “God’s Acre,” this is the final resting place for a diverse group of people who shared...
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Grieving mom calls on GSP to rein in pursuits
Kate Schoenke can count on one hand how many holidays, major milestones or special occasions have passed without both her children at home. Now, she and her 16-yearold daughter are trying to process what an endless string of Christmases and birthdays...
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