Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced a 2026 Republican campaign for governor on Wednesday, joining a competitive primary that already includes Lt. Gov. Burt Jones and Attorney General Chris Carr and comes after former President Donald Trump endorsed Jones last month.
Raffensperger, a conservative Republican who resisted pressure from Trump in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election, said in a campaign launch video that he would "follow the law and the Constitution" and pursue a bold conservative agenda to "build Georgia even stronger." The 70-year-old engineering entrepreneur outlined proposals including eliminating the state income tax, capping property taxes for seniors, repealing taxes and fees on homebuyer closing costs, expanding tax credits for parental school choice, banning puberty-blocking drugs for gender-affirming care, and removing what he called "woke curriculums" from schools.
Raffensperger's campaign statement also said he would "work alongside President Donald Trump and congressional leaders to bring jobs back to Georgia, deport criminal aliens, and restore law and order in communities across the state." The pledge to cooperate with Trump comes despite a highly publicized clash between the two men after the 2020 election, when Raffensperger rejected Trump's efforts to overturn President Joe Biden's narrow victory in Georgia.
In an early January 2021 phone call, Trump urged Raffensperger to "find" enough votes to change the state's result; Raffensperger told the then-president that his data was wrong and "we believe our numbers are right." That exchange led to Trump's public rebuke and to Trump backing primary challengers against Raffensperger and Gov. Brian Kemp in 2022. Both Kemp and Raffensperger defeated those challengers and won re-election that year.
Raffensperger's entry reshapes the contest to succeed Kemp, who is term-limited and cannot run in 2026. The GOP primary field already centers on Jones, who has secured Trump’s endorsement, and Carr, creating a three-way contest that party strategists and outside groups are likely to watch closely.
The timing of Raffensperger's announcement intersected with another notable development in Georgia politics: the day before his launch, former Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan declared a Democratic campaign for governor. Duncan, who also criticized Trump's efforts to overturn Georgia's 2020 results and later switched parties, joins a Democratic primary field that includes former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, former DeKalb County CEO Mike Thurmond and former State Sen. Jason Esteves.
Kevin Donohoe of the Democratic Governors Association said Raffensperger's candidacy "injects a new level of chaos into what was already a messy primary — and is bad news for Burt Jones and Chris Carr." The DGA's comment framed the Republican contest as potentially fractious, while the Democratic side also reflects recent party realignments and shifting political profiles ahead of the 2026 cycle.
Georgia has evolved into a national battleground in recent election cycles. Democrats carried the state in the 2020 presidential election and again in the 2020–21 U.S. Senate runoffs that helped determine Senate control, but Republicans have won every gubernatorial contest in Georgia since 2002. The lineup of candidates on both sides, and the high-profile intraparty divisions stemming from the 2020 dispute, suggest the governor’s race will be closely watched by donors and national party organizations.
Raffensperger gained national attention for his defense of Georgia's certified election results, an episode that shaped his political standing within the Republican Party and drew both national criticism from Trump and support from election integrity advocates. His campaign for governor will test whether his stance during the 2020 aftermath, and his stated conservative policy platform, can win broad GOP primary support in a state where Trump remains influential.
Raffensperger did not immediately provide a detailed campaign schedule or a list of senior staff in his launch materials. Primary filing deadlines and the timing of other likely entrants will determine how quickly the race crystallizes into a definitive contest for the Republican nomination and set the terms for general election campaigning in a state that remains central to national electoral strategies.