KY General Assembly Week 7: First bill signed, school talks & social media

Folks, it finally happened.

We’ve got our first new law of the 2026 General Assembly, and it only took 30 legislative days (out of 60) to make it happen.

Senate Bill 172, sponsored by Sen. Phillip Wheeler, R-Pikeville, allows the Public Service Commission to give utility companies the leeway to spread out fuel adjustment costs, “reduc(ing) volatility for customers.”

The bill passed 38-0 in the Senate, 95-0 in the House and was signed by Gov. Andy Beshear on Thursday, the day after it landed on his (figurative) desk. (Beshear was in Washington, D.C., for the National Governors Association gathering.)

Will other bills soon join SB 172 in the rarefied league of legislation that has cleared both houses? To be determined!

One bill that is seemingly in no hurry, however, is HB 500 — the budget.

GOP leaders have assured everyone that the bill filed in late January is merely a starting point for the budget and that this is not what the final spending plan will look like.

That being said, we’ve seen a number of Republican lawmakers come out against the bill recently following the news that, as written, it could cause health care costs for state employees, including public school personnel, to skyrocket. Democrats, who make up a legislative superminority, have released their own ideas.

‘The opioid fight of our generation’

Proponents of House Bill 227, a bill aimed at limiting social media addiction and data-driven targeting for children under 16, called the legislation “the opioid fight of our generation” in a House committee hearing Wednesday. The bill passed out of committee with full Republican support and a couple Democratic “pass” votes.

The bill, from Rep. Matt Lockett, R-Nicholasville, is an attempt to crack down on addictive design features and algorithms in social media, which they say help foment harassment and exploitation of minors online.

The bill would require platforms to obtain verifiable parental consent before allowing children under 16 to maintain accounts — after they estimate the user’s age — and prohibit addictive design features and profile-based advertising for children. It would also mandate account termination rights for parents and create a pathway for parents and children to sue companies for damages.

The practices covered under “addictive features” are several. They include continuously loading content, or “infinite scrolling,” display of a profile-based feed, most push notifications, autoplay video, display of reactions to post such as “likes,” and display of awards based on hours spent on the platform.

Presenting alongside Lockett, Deputy Attorney General Wil Schroder said Attorney General Russell Coleman’s office is already engaged in legal fights with platforms Meta, TikTok and Roblox on this very issue.

“(The bill) takes the same concerns being litigated in court and turns them into preventative public policy before the harm occurs, rather than after. The fight to protect our kids online is the opioid fight of our generation. We’re using all the tools in the toolbox,” Schroder said.

A committee substitute introduced and adopted to the bill Wednesday morning cut artificial intelligence companies from the bill, focusing it squarely on social media platforms.

A few opponents of the bill spoke against it Wednesday on free speech grounds.

Amy Bos, vice president of Net Choice, a trade association for companies online, warned that the age estimation required in the bill to determine if a user is under 16 years old would necessitate more data collection on them.

“There is no commercially available technology that can reliably estimate a user’s age from behavioral data alone at that confidence level … platforms will be pressured to collect far more personal data than they currently do, including biometric information or government IDs,” Bos said.

They also raised First Amendment issues.

Ari Cohn, an attorney with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, said “the government has a valid interest in protecting youth from harm,” but there are some constitutional complications with the bill.

“HB, 227 does not regulate how a parent may or may not raise their child. Rather, it regulates how and whether minors may speak and access information online, and how private parties may speak to them,” Cohn said. “So, the relevant question here is not what rights parents have vis a vis the government, but whether the bill would infringe on the first amendment rights of all, including minors, and as it stands, the answer to that is yes, in our opinion.”

-Reported by Austin Horn

More takeaways from Week 7 of the 2026 General Assembly

• Abortion as homicide: Rep. Josh Calloway filed House Bill 690 redefining “person” to include unborn children from fertilization, making abortion subject to homicide laws. The bill faces long odds as similar proposals have failed and Republicans show little appetite for abortion changes. -Reported by Austin Horn and Hannah Pinski
• School choice: Kentucky House Republicans introduced legislation to enroll in Trump’s federal tax credit program for private school expenses, the same day the state Supreme Court struck down charter school funding as unconstitutional. Critics call it another attack on public education. -Reported by Valarie Honeycutt Spears
• Teacher safety: Senate Bill 101 requiring 12-month expulsions for students in grades 6-12 who assault school employees passed committee unanimously. Sponsor Matt Nunn cited over 25,000 reported teacher assaults since 2021 and shared a letter from an injured teacher. -Reported by Valarie Honeycutt Spears
• Buffer zone: The Kentucky Senate approved legislation creating a 25-foot buffer zone around first responders and criminalizing harassment after warnings. Democrats opposed the bill citing First Amendment concerns, while Republicans said it protects officers doing their jobs. -Reported by Hannah Pinski
• Logan’s Law: Kentucky House committee advanced “Logan’s Law” responding to the early release of Ronald Exantus, who was convicted in the 2015 stabbing death of 6-year-old Logan Tipton. (He is now back in prison.) The bill would toughen sentences and restrict early releases. -Reported by John Cheves

• Tort reform: Business groups are pushing Senate Bill 195 to restrict lawsuit rights and damage collection in Kentucky courts. The bill would shift fault responsibility and create new procedural hurdles, while trial lawyers call it harmful red tape. -Reported by John Cheves
• Bar association: House Bill 526 would make Kentucky Bar Association membership voluntary instead of mandatory for practicing attorneys. The bill passed the House 70-21 but faces constitutional questions about the Supreme Court’s authority over bar regulation. -Reported by Piper Hansen
• Labor issues: A Kentucky Center for Economic Policy poll found 47% of voters view unions favorably and support policies expanding organized labor and increasing wages. Meanwhile, only 9% said they’ve been helped by recent state income tax cuts. -Reported by Piper Hansen and Aaron Mudd
• Organ donation: House committee approved legislation requiring immediate pause during organ retrieval if signs of life appear, following federal investigations that found 103 concerning cases over four years. The bill aims to rebuild public trust in organ donation. -Reported by John Cheves
• Prison deaths: Kentucky prison deaths jumped to 63 in 2025, the highest since 2021, prompting Sen. Keturah Herron to introduce bills creating oversight panels and requiring better death investigations. Families cite lack of transparency from corrections officials. -Reported by Taylor Six
• Housing supply: Rep. Susan Witten filed two bills to reduce regulatory barriers for home construction, preventing new lot size requirements and allowing single-family building codes for four-unit buildings. Kentucky faces a potential 287,000-unit housing shortage by 2029. -Reported by Piper Hansen
• Impeachment response: Justice Pamela Goodwine filed a 27-page response dismissing an impeachment petition against her as incomplete and meritless. The petition alleged conflict of interest in an education case. -Reported by Taylor Six and Piper Hansen
• Ron DeSantis: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis testified in Frankfort supporting a resolution calling for a federal balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. -Reported by Hannah Pinski

The above takeaways were produced with the help of an AI tool, which summarized previous stories reported and written by Herald-Leader journalists. This content was reviewed and edited by journalists in the newsroom. Read more on our AI policy here.

What we’re looking for in Week 8 of the 2026 General Assembly

The budget. Like, the budget as it might actually be enacted, not just a framework. Not to sound like a broken record, but, the budget is still the main thing here. It’s kind of important!

And as I noted last week, the state constitution only allows appropriations and revenue bills in even-numbered years, unless “it shall be agreed to by three-fifths of all the members elected to each house.”

Also, I’m curious to see what constitutional amendments could make it to our ballots in November. We’ve seen some of the usual suspects emerge — i.e. Sen. Chris McDaniel’s perennial effort to rein in the governor’s veto effort — but passage in one chamber doesn’t mean smooth sailing in the other.

This week is also the last full week for legislators to file new bills, so except a lot of action on that front in the days ahead.

We’ll soon enter the part of session where lawmakers kick it into high gear, leaving us to wonder what the heck they’d been doing those first two months. (This happens every session, and I’m no closer to an answer than I was in years past.) Prepare yourself accordingly for some busy and long days. I suggest a well-stocked snack drawer and plentiful coffee.

Thank you for following the Herald-Leader’s coverage of the Kentucky General Assembly. If you haven’t already, consider signing up for our (twice-weekly during session!) Bluegrass Politics newsletter.

Give me a shout at tduvall@herald-leader.com with any feedback, tips or ideas.

This story was originally published February 23, 2026 at 5:00 AM.

Tessa Duvall

Lexington Herald-Leader

859-334-0430

Tessa has been the Herald-Leader’s Politics and Public Affairs Editor since March 2024, after acting as Frankfort Bureau Chief since joining the paper in August 2022. A native of Bowling Green and a graduate of Western Kentucky University, Tessa has also reported in Texas, Florida and Louisville, where she covered education, criminal justice and policing.