Judge Mike Jacobs has served on the State Court of DeKalb County since June 2015.
Mike serves on the board of directors of Leadership DeKalb, chairs Government Day for the program, and is a member of the Class of 2016, the best class ever. He also serves on the boards of the Atlanta Bar Association’s Judicial Section, the Stonewall Bar Association of Georgia, and the International Association of LGBTQ+ Judges. He is a member of the Judicial Council of Georgia’s Committee on Access to Justice.
Prior to his judicial service, Mike served ten and a half years in the Georgia House of Representatives, representing the DeKalb communities of Brookhaven, Chamblee, and Toco Hills. He was chairman of the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Oversight Committee (MARTOC), the joint House and Senate committee that oversees MARTA’s management, budget, and fiscal affairs. He also served as chairman of one of the two subcommittees of the House Judiciary Committee.
Mike served two years on the Georgia Code Revision Commission, which oversees the publishing of the Official Code of Georgia Annotated. He also served one year representing the State of Georgia on the Uniform Law Commission, the organization that writes and revises uniform state statutes such as the Uniform Commercial Code.
In 2005, the Atlanta Business Chronicle selected Mike as one of Metro Atlanta’s “40 Under 40” Up and Coming Young Leaders.
In 2010, Mike received the Allen Thornell Political Advancement Award from Georgia Equality for authoring and passing a stronger anti-bullying law for public schools.
In 2012, Mike served on the Special Joint Committee on Criminal Justice Reform, which vetted major reforms that place greater emphasis on rehabilitating non-violent offenders to lead productive lives.
In 2014, Interim CEO Lee May appointed Mike to the DeKalb Operations Task Force (OTF). The OTF recommended county government reforms that the General Assembly enacted to help our county function better, including DeKalb’s SPLOST, which Mike authored and passed in 2015.
In 2019, Mike was recognized by the Stonewall Bar Association of Georgia at its annual awards gala with the award for Outstanding Service to the Stonewall Community.
Before joining the bench, Mike was a solo practitioner for four years, focusing his practice on consumer bankruptcy and debtor-creditor litigation. Prior to starting his own law practice, Mike was an associate at Alston & Bird, Krevolin & Horst, and Hall, Booth, Smith & Slover.
Mike received his law degree, magna cum laude, from the University of Georgia School of Law in 2003. While at UGA Law, he served as Executive Articles Editor of the Georgia Law Review. In 1997, Mike received his bachelor’s degree from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C.
Mike’s beautiful wife Evan is a speech-language pathologist in the DeKalb County School System. Mike and Evan are the proud parents of three children, Jonah, Eli, and Samantha. Jonah and Eli attend Chamblee Middle School and Samantha goes to Montgomery Elementary School.
Mike is the first openly LGBTQ countywide elected official in DeKalb County history and the county’s first openly LGBTQ trial judge. In DeKalb, he remains the only countywide elected official and only trial judge who identifies as a member of the LGBTQ community.
Mike and Evan enjoy traveling, Broadway musicals, and karaoke.
Judge Mike Jacobs 