Home / Georgia / Georgia Capitol Conflict: Speaker Jon Burns Faces Backlash Over Colton Moore Ban

Georgia Capitol Conflict: Speaker Jon Burns Faces Backlash Over Colton Moore Ban

A con­fronta­tion erupt­ed at the Geor­gia Capi­tol as Sen­a­tor Colton Moore was blocked from attend­ing Gov­er­nor Kem­p’s State of the State address, spark­ing wide­spread con­tro­ver­sy. Speak­er Jon Burns, who banned Moore from the House cham­ber months ear­li­er, refused to lift the restric­tion, due to Moore’s past crit­i­cisms of late Speak­er David Ral­ston.

Moore, assert­ing his con­sti­tu­tion­al right to attend, was stopped by staff and lat­er arrest­ed with­out resis­tance, esca­lat­ing ten­sions. Crit­ics blame Burns for the staged con­flict, espe­cial­ly as scruti­ny inten­si­fies around Ralston’s leg­isla­tive his­to­ry. Calls for Burns’ res­ig­na­tion are grow­ing amid bipar­ti­san dis­con­tent.

Gov­er­nor Kemp and Lt. Gov­er­nor Burt Jones are under fire for not inter­ven­ing to pre­vent the dis­rup­tion, which over­shad­owed the gov­er­nor’s address. The inci­dent has reignit­ed debates about polit­i­cal retal­i­a­tion and the han­dling of leg­isla­tive author­i­ty in Geor­gia.

  • What hap­pened yes­ter­day at the Geor­gia Capi­tol was avoid­able. Every­thing is the fault of Speak­er Jon Burns, the rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Dist 159. It is up to the peo­ple of dis­trict 159 to call for the res­ig­na­tion of Rep Jon Burns, but he does need to resign as Speak­er of the House. 
  • Yes­ter­day Gov­er­nor Kemp gave his State of the State address in front of a joint ses­sion. They use the House cham­ber floor for the joint ses­sion. Burns does pre­side over the House cham­ber. 
  • Now Colton Moore is the duly elect­ed Sen­a­tor from dis­trict 53 and had every con­sti­tu­tion­al right to walk on to the floor of the house dur­ing the joint ses­sion. Every­thing could have been calm. 
  • This con­flict start­ed March 14, 2024. Speak­er Jon Burns banned Colton Moore on that day. Colton Moore tried to reach out to Jon Burns to resolve the issue before yes­ter­day. But every­thing was planned and staged for it to hap­pen. Why was it allowed to hap­pen? Why didn’t Gov­er­nor Kemp call Speak­er Burns to tell him to not allow any­thing to take the news cycle off the State of the State address? Why didn’t Lt Gov­er­nor Burt Jones inter­vene? 
  • The sergeant of arms was not to allow Colton Moore into the House cham­ber. Kei­th Williams is gen­er­al coun­sel for the speak­er ‘s office. Why does Speak­er Burns have his gen­er­al coun­cil at the door? The Geor­gia State Police is under the direc­tion of the Gov­er­nor office author­i­ty in the state of Geor­gia. 
  • Why did Colton Moore get banned? Jon Burns dou­bled down. Jon Burns faces bipar­ti­san push­back after ban­ish­ing repub­li­can law­mak­ers. Here is his com­ment: The sit­u­a­tion out­side of the House Cham­ber this morn­ing was incred­i­bly unfor­tu­nate. (it could have been avoid­able). The Sen­a­tor refused to coop­er­ate with door­keep­ers and law enforce­ment, and cre­at­ed a dan­ger­ous sit­u­a­tion when he chose to use force against our law enforce­ment (no he did­n’t, he stood there as he was hand­cuffed, he only tried to do his con­sti­tu­tion­al duty by attempt­ing to enter the cham­ber) ded­i­cat­ed door­keep­ers and House staff. I want to thank every House staff mem­ber and our entire House fam­i­ly for hold­ing the line to hon­or Speak­er Ralston’s lega­cy of ded­i­cat­ed ser­vice to our state. As you saw today, the integri­ty and deco­rum of this House are non-negotiable–period. 
  • March 14, 2024, Colton Moore went to the floor of the Sen­ate and called out David Ral­ston. It was ugly. David Ral­ston put mon­ey into the bud­get to build a UNG cam­pus in Blue Ridge where Gov­er­nor Kemp signed the Bud­get that year. After that Speak­er Ral­ston dies. On March 14 they passed a res­o­lu­tion nam­ing the build­ing after David Ral­ston. That day Colton Moore gave an ugly accu­rate speech from the well of the Sen­ate. It may have been the wrong place at the wrong time, but it doesn’t change the fact that every­thing he said that day was true. 
  • Jon Burns has caused every­one to look into David Ral­ston. 
  • David Ral­ston was chair­man of the Judi­cial Non-Civ­il com­mit­tee in 2006. He intro­duced the bill SB503. This is a self ben­e­fit­ing bill. Sec­tion 3…relating to grounds for grant­i­ng con­tin­u­ances when a par­ty or a party’s attor­ney is in atten­dance at the Gen­er­al Assem­bly, as sub­sec­tion and by inter­est­ing a new sub­sec­tion at the end of such Code sec­tion to read as fol­lows: a con­tin­u­ance and stay shall also be grant­ed for such oth­er times as the mem­ber of the Gen­er­al Assem­bly or staff mem­ber cer­ti­fies to the court that his or her pres­ence else­where is required by his or her duties with the Gen­er­al Assem­bly. There was a form let­ter to be able to claim Leg­isla­tive leave by law. The judge in ques­tion had to grant you con­tin­u­ance. That is why you have all these com­mit­tee meet­ings, study com­mit­tees. You can always find a way to be busy. Now if you are speak­er of the house you have statewide duties year round.  
  • The accu­sa­tion Colton Moore said was that David Ral­ston sold his sta­tus as defense attor­ney to nev­er go to court. David Ral­ston abused the Leg­isla­tive leave. 
  • Jon Burns fired up the Ral­ston arti­cles and research out there. If he was real­ly con­cerned about the “hon­or­able” Speak­er Ral­ston he would have left this alone. 
  • SR687 was the res­o­lu­tion to name the build­ing. The gov­er­nor that signed the bill SB503 grant­i­ng leg­isla­tive leave was Son­ny Per­due.  
  • A Geor­gia sen­a­tor was exiled from the GOP Sen­ate cau­cus and then was banned from the State House cham­bers. On that day Colton Moore went to the floor of the Sen­ate and gave a speech and like it or not he didn’t lie. 
  • WE have had it from March until yes­ter­day. We knew yes­ter­day was com­ing. Colton Moore had a con­sti­tu­tion­al right to be in those cham­bers. The House mem­bers did not vote. The house mem­bers are not allowed to have an opin­ion. If they speak out they are not allowed to get a bill on the floor. This is the author­i­ty they have over the peo­ple and the elect­ed offi­cials. The day before this hap­pens the gov­er­nor’s office knows that every­one is get­ting whipped up into a fren­zy. What do they do about it? 
  • It is under­stood that Colton Moore sent a let­ter to Jon Burns in advance that he had a con­sti­tu­tion­al right to rep­re­sent his dis­trict that he will be attend­ing the State of State address. Jon Burns ignores the let­ter. Colton Moore goes to Speak­er Burns’ office and is told that Burns was busy. And then made a sec­ond attempt. It was cor­dial until Speak­er Burns said if you want to go on the floor you have to apol­o­gize for the speech on David Ral­ston. Speak­er Burns put in a con­di­tion for the speech. Why would you apol­o­gize for telling the truth? That is when Jon Burns said he would not allow Colton into the House cham­bers. Colton Moore tried to avoid it. This is 100% Jon Burns. 
  • Kei­th Williams, the gen­er­al coun­sel of the Speak­ers office putting his hands on Colton Moore and throw­ing him to the ground. There were ques­tions last night for arrest war­rants for Kei­th Williams and Corey Mulkey (the door­keep­er), it has not been con­firmed.  Colton Moore did not push back, he didn’t fight back when he was get­ting arrest­ed. 
  • 82 Lt. Gov­er­nor Burt Jones state­ment: “
  • We are ask­ing for Speak­er Jon Burns’ res­ig­na­tion. They are safe­guard­ing Speak­er Ral­ston and the office because they don’t want any­one to look around. 
  • On Jan 6, 2021 there were peo­ple assem­bled at the US capi­tol. They want to know who you are. The mag­nate is if you thought there were agi­ta­tors in the crowd on Jan6. Now yes­ter­day there were agi­ta­tors in the crowd to draw you in. Why would Gov­er­nor Kemp walk the red car­pet on his day and all this to take the news­cy­cle? 

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