Hello, and happy holidays! Hope everyone is getting a chance to relax and spend time doing whatever brings you joy.
Please, join me in adding one more holiday to your roster: The Gallery Pass officially turns one year old Friday!
OK, technically, she turns one today because that’s when I created the Substack in silence and consulted exactly one (1) person (about the color palette; was told it wasn’t “hot girl” enough; did not change said palette) before hard-launching my baby girl on Dec. 27, but I’m perfectly fine with a multi-day celebration for her.
Honestly, TGP was a Hail Mary attempt at maintaining some sort of public relevancy in the Kentucky political journalism world after I quit my full-time job a few months prior. I lowkey assumed I had missed my time to shine and no one would want this Substack.
I very quickly realized that was not the case, and now TGP is probably one of the most successful things I’ve done in my life — all because of y’all. Thanks for being here to begin with and for sticking around, even with all of the growing pains. It has been a treat and an honor.
Please feel free to celebrate in any manner you believe fitting for a newsletter dubbed “A Hot Girl’s Guide to Kentucky Politics.” I, for one, will be having cake and crab legs.
Oh, and crafting a few prototypes of potential TGP merch 👀 since it was recently brought to my attention that some folks would love some TGP merch (outside of the friendship bracelets that kept getting stolen out of people’s mailboxes).
Please don’t threaten me with a good time — I already have a few concepts in the works, but would love to hear what y’all are thinking. Not just about merch, but about session, paid sub perks, general hot takes: drop any and everything in this survey!
Before we get into the news, a quick reminder
If you’re reading this on Thursday, fantastic! If you’re reading this Friday or later, sorry.
As I shared last week, paid subscription prices will be going up at, like, 12:01 a.m. Eastern Friday.
Again, that pricing will look like:
$6/month for monthly subs
$70/year for annual subs
+ the create-your-own pricing Passholder plan for those of you on that will not change.
And again, this means more paid sub perks, including exclusive commenting access and, starting in January, a once-weekly paid sub-only newsletter. And probably more perks to come.
OK, but seriously, the news
The political universe thought it would be fun to drop a bunch of news right after I wrote an entire newsletter about how there wasn’t really any news.
I know everyone’s on break rn, so here’s the quickest rundown I can muster.
Oh goodie, more House Education Committee action
The House dropped its list of committee leaders last week — you can find the full list here.
One major change: The House Education Committee has been split into two, with one new committee focusing on higher ed and the other looking at K-12.
Current House Ed leadership — Chair James Tipton and Vice Chair Shane Baker — will be serving in those same roles in the postsecondary committee, which is almost guaranteed to have to deal with the anti-DEI in higher ed legislation everyone expects to be a top GOP priority.
Rep. Scott Lewis — a former superintendent — and Rep. Mike Clines — who led schools for the Diocese of Covington — will run the K-12 side of things.
Should be fascinating, and I’m excited to have more reasons to show up to Frankfort. Most pressing issue on my education-reporter-turned-politics-reporter mind: Will either of these committees take over the normal (dreaded) House Ed 8 a.m. meeting timeslot, or will we all agree that is a ridiculous time and make both committees meet literally at any time after that? Stay tuned.
(Not sure if I mentioned it last newsletter, but it looks like the #KYGA25 committee schedule won’t be finalized and public until January. Once I know it, I will share it.)
Did someone say education?
The Kentucky Supreme Court finally ruled on a legal challenge over a 2022 law that directly targeted JCPS — and literally just JCPS — saying the law was good to go into effect.
JCPS fought over pieces of the bill that would shift power away from the locally elected school board to the superintendent and restrict how often the board can meet. Those things had been blocked by a lower court, but they can now happen. But only for JCPS.
I don’t mean to take up your precious holiday time with a ton of education policy analysis (yes I do), but a few things to point out.
This ruling will likely make it a lot easier for the GOP-dominated legislature to push legislation directly aimed at JCPS because the court lowkey basically said it was OK to craft bills targeting one type of district, and JCPS is the only district in Kentucky considered to be a “county school district in a county with a consolidated local government.” So, easy loophole, now court-approved.
And this comes as some lawmakers have made it pretty clear they’ll be looking at ways to “fix” low-performing schools, particularly within JCPS. Oh, and the JCPS task force wants to meet for another year. Oh, and current JCPS Superintendent Marty Pollio retires in six months.
Grossberg already has a challenger
Basically completely powerless Democratic Rep. Daniel Grossberg, who is set to start his second term in a few weeks, already has a primary challenger for 2026.
If you’re thinking, “Wow, isn’t it a little early for that?” you’d be correct. Louisville Dem Max Morley announced his campaign last week, so we even have a bit of a time delay on my end.
And no, this is not — I repeat, NOT — the Max Morley who is apparently a 6’2” British man who won a season of “Love Island.” Different Max Morley!
You’re looking for a guy who looks more like the guy in the center:
Grossberg’s district in Louisville is pretty solidly Dem, so it’ll be interesting to watch who else throws their hat into the ring over the next year.
ICYMI: Grossberg is facing a series of harassment and misconduct allegations and related state-level investigations, along with being barred from most Democratic events and kicked out of his own caucus.
Grossberg has denied the allegations and refused to resign or drop out of his race this fall (he ran unopposed). And in light of Morley’s entry into the 2026 race, Grossberg told WHAS he plans on running again and expects to be reelected in 2026.
The big question for now, though, is what, if anything, will the full legislature do when session starts? The only legislative power Grossberg really has at this point is being able to vote on the House floor. A two-thirds vote could remove him from office.
Also ICYMI: Like many young women in Kentucky politics, I wrote about my experiences with Grossberg in this newsletter from September. I’ve publicly called for him to resign, so keep that in mind when you read my reporting on his situation rn and in the future.
Counting down to…
12 days until the first day of #KYGA25 (Jan. 7)
92 days until the last day of #KYGA25 (March 28)
219 days until Fancy Farm 2025 (Aug. 2)
The upcoming planner
Friends, we are clear of scheduled political happenings until Jan. 7.
Please use this time to prepare your freshest Frankfort ‘Fits 💅 and recommend your favorite restaurants/cafes/breweries/places to cry/overall top spots in Frankfort to be including in my upcoming #KYGA25 bucket list right here.
Where else to find me
Bluesky: Follow my main account here, and follow TGP’s account here.
TikTok: Is right here.
Twitter: I’m still not fully back, but someone asked me to return to Twitter, so here you are. My main account is here and TGP’s account is here.
The Gallery Pass: As we approach the session, make sure you tell your friends, coworkers and favorite policy watchers to sign up for TGP. Here’s a direct subscription link.
OK, I think that is enough for this newsletter. Talk soon, bye!
I'm not saying that the friendship bracelets aren't being stolen but another possibility is that the envelopes are being torn open during processing since they aren't flat and the bracelets are falling out.