Democrat Keisha Lance Bottoms has been projected to win Georgia's gubernatorial race, making her the first Black woman elected governor in American history and the first Democrat to hold the office in nearly three decades. The former mayor of Atlanta's victory flips the governor's mansion blue for the first time since 1998.
Bottoms' win is a significant development in a state that has increasingly become a political battleground. Republicans have held the governor's office since 2002. Her victory follows President Joe Biden's narrow win in Georgia in 2020, which ended a streak of Republican presidential victories in the state dating back to 1992.
She will succeed Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, who is term-limited. Bottoms, who served as Atlanta's mayor from 2018 to 2022, later joined Biden's White House as a senior advisor. She ran on a platform that included expanding Medicaid, raising the state's minimum wage, and increasing pay for public employees.
Bottoms faced Republican businessman Rick Jackson, a first-time candidate who invested over $200 million of his personal wealth into his campaign. Jackson, who defeated a Trump-endorsed candidate in the Republican primary, campaigned on phasing out Georgia's income tax and presented himself as an outsider businessman.
The race drew national attention as Georgia has shifted from a Republican stronghold to a closely contested swing state. Biden narrowly carried Georgia in 2020, and while Donald Trump won the state in 2024, the trend indicates a tighter political landscape.
