Data Center Dynasty: Burt Jones’ Billion-Dollar Betrayal

In this fiery Octo­ber 16, 2025, episode of The Geor­gia Hour on Voice of Rur­al Amer­i­ca, host BKP deliv­ers a no-holds-barred take­down of Geor­gia’s Repub­li­can estab­lish­ment, zero­ing in on Lieu­tenant Gov­er­nor Burt Jones’ alleged con­flicts of inter­est and the brew­ing gov­er­nor’s race. Kick­ing off with vin­di­ca­tion for his long-held pre­dic­tions, BKP unpacks how Jones—fresh off a Don­ald Trump endorsement—pushed through a 2023 bipar­ti­san bill rewrit­ing cer­tifi­cate-of-need (CON) laws for hos­pi­tals, a move crit­ics say was tai­lor-made to green­light a 100-bed pri­vate hos­pi­tal on fam­i­ly-owned land in Bucks Coun­ty. This isn’t just about health­care; it’s a gate­way to a mas­sive $10 bil­lion “Riv­er Park” mega-project along I‑75, dom­i­nat­ed by up to 11 mil­lion square feet of mam­moth data centers—dwarfing Lenox Mall in scale—owned by Jones’ wealthy father, Bill Jones, whose Bucks Coun­ty empire spans vast tracts of land.

BKP con­nects the dots to a web of cozy alliances: Josh McK­oon, Geor­gia GOP chair­man, has relo­cat­ed to Bucks Coun­ty, where his wife, Jacque­line McK­oon, now leads the local Cham­ber of Com­merce. He rails against “trade deals” in the leg­is­la­ture, cit­ing exam­ples like Sen. Bran­don Beach bloat­ing an innocu­ous Soap Box Der­by bill into a gam­bling wind­fall for cronies. Cit­ing an Atlanta Jour­nal-Con­sti­tu­tion exposé, BKP high­lights the pro­jec­t’s piv­ot from vague “com­put­er stor­age ware­hous­es” to data cen­ter bonan­za, fueled by Geor­gia’s boom­ing tech hub sta­tus (e.g., Ama­zon Web Ser­vices’ $270 mil­lion land grab). He warns of impend­ing leg­is­la­tion grant­i­ng tax abate­ments to data centers—mirroring sweet­heart deals for Hyundai, Kia, and the flee­ing film industry—framing it as eco­nom­ic “devel­op­ment” at rur­al Geor­gians’ expense. BKP urges lis­ten­ers fight­ing data cen­ters to rec­on­cile their out­rage with sup­port­ing a Trump-backed can­di­date poten­tial­ly enrich­ing his kin.

The episode piv­ots to the 2026 gov­er­nor’s race, spot­light­ing a fresh poll show­ing Jones surg­ing at 32%, Sec­re­tary of State Brad Raf­fensperg­er polling a sur­pris­ing 15% (his debut in such sur­veys), Chris Carr at 12–18%, and dark hors­es like Clark Dean at 2%. BKP blasts Car­r’s point­ed cam­paign jab: vow­ing not to “rig the sys­tem to enrich my fam­i­ly… on your backs,” a direct shot at Jones amid the scan­dal. He ties this to Trump’s recent com­ments blast­ing Sen. Jon Ossoff as a “weak, inef­fec­tive” enabler of crime and open bor­ders, while hint­ing at Ful­ton Coun­ty vote irreg­u­lar­i­ties from 2020—fueling spec­u­la­tion Trump won’t let Raf­fensperg­er, the elec­tion over­seer, any­where near the gov­er­nor­ship.

Shift­ing to the U.S. Sen­ate race, BKP ana­lyzes Trump’s coy “I’m fol­low­ing that race very care­ful­ly” video, inter­pret­ing it as strate­gic fence-sit­ting. Rep. Mike Collins’ camp is “opti­mistic” about secur­ing the nod, thanks to MAGA-aligned bills like one Trump could tout in a State of the Union. Rep. Bud­dy Carter posi­tions him­self as a “MAGA war­rior” with deep pock­ets, while Kem­p’s hand­picked Derek Doo­ley climbs polls, bol­stered by Nick Saban’s pitch­es to Trump. BKP cau­tions against Kem­p’s pleas for Trump to hold off, empha­siz­ing the endorse­ment chase over vot­er out­reach as the pri­ma­ry looms.

Wrap­ping with irrev­er­ent jabs, BKP pro­motes Scott Howard’s Sub­stack (“Unmask­ing Greg the Weasel Dolezal”—a graph­ic-laden roast of a Kemp ally) and flash­es his “Cer­ti­fied Geor­gia Repub­li­can Par­ty Out­law” badge. He mocks DNC Chair tin-cup fundrais­ing woes amid Geor­gia’s eco­nom­ic woes, then tees up guest Ver­non Jones (run­ning for Sec­re­tary of State) with a video intro, promis­ing more unfil­tered truth post-break. Clock­ing in as a rapid-fire, con­spir­a­cy-tinged ral­ly cry, the episode embod­ies BKP’s sig­na­ture blend of insid­er scoops, Trump loy­al­ty, and anti-elite fury—urging lis­ten­ers to “do the research” on the gath­er­ing polit­i­cal storm.