Sen. Ben Watson

Guest Columnist

The 2026 General Assembly is beginning to close down and now has only five days left to the final session of this legislative term. All state representatives and senators, as well as all state elected government positions, will end at the end of the year, and 2027 will usher in a new General Assembly, as well as a new governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state and others.

The most significant bill which passed the legislature this week was suspending the state gas tax for 60 days. The bill lowers the gas tax by $.333 per gallon of gasoline.

This is especially important in the face of the Iran war and the supply of oil, as businesses and citizens face rising diesel and gas costs. Gov. Brian Kemp quickly signed the suspension, thus immediately providing nearly $400 million in direct relief for hardworking Georgians and the businesses that keep our state moving.

The Georgia Senate gave final passage to a measure providing up to $500 in income tax rebates to Georgians who filed state income tax returns in both 2025 and 2024.

House Bill 1000 passed the Senate with a unanimous vote. Once signed by the governor, the state Department of Revenue will determine when Georgians could get the rebate, which will be $250 for single filers, $375 for head of households and $500 for married couples filing jointly.

House Bill 535, which is intended to punish those trafficking in fentanyl, also passed. The legislation creates a statutory sentencing cap of 40 years imprisonment for fentanyl trafficking, up from the 30-year previous cap for other substances and imposes a fine of up to $1 million. This legislation passed unanimously. One bill that is making its way through and is getting close to General Assembly approval is House Bill 880, the income tax rate reduction effort. The House version of the bill is similar to the Senate’s with the same tax rate reduction but with an increase to the standard deduction that was similar to what was in the Senate bill. The legislation would reduce the income tax rate by a tenth of a percentage point per year, conditioned upon continued growth in state revenue, until the rate reaches 3.99%. The current income tax rate is 5.19%, but last month the House passed H.B. 1001, which will drop the rate to 4.99% retroactively to the start of this year.

H.B. 880 would simultaneously increase the standard deduction. It is $12,000 for a single filer now and would increase $600 a year until it reaches $18,000. These numbers would double for married couples filing jointly.

A legislative study committee learned last summer that more than one in five students had missed more than 15 days of school in 2024, nearly double the rate in 2019.

The rate, missing six to 15 days, climbed to 42%, six points higher than in 2019. To address the issue of absenteeism, bipartisan efforts to remedy this situation were heard and discussed. One remedy includes that students failing to attend class would be subjected to penalties including prohibiting participation in extracurricular and interscholastic sports and suspending driver’s licenses. The punishment would only be a last resort. Schools would have to first identify students at risk of missing too many days, then they would have to craft attendance intervention plans with the students and parents.

The student would have to sign the plan, and noncompliance would trigger the sanctions.

I will keep you updated on legislation affecting our community as we progress through the session.

Thank you for your continued interest in the work of our General Assembly.

As your public servant, feel free to visit me at the Capitol or to reach out to me by phone or email.

I am in 325A, Coverdell Legislative Office Building. My office phone number is (404) 656-7880, and my email is ben.watson@senate.ga.gov.

I look forward to continuing to serve you.