With the 2024 presidential election now mercifully behind us, we can now get down to the serious business of crystal- balling Georgia’s 2026 campaign cycle. Over the next two years, we’ll be treated to the political equivalent of MMA death cage matches over one of our U.S. Senate seats and all the state’s constitutional offices, including governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state, attorney general and several hundred other positions.
With Governor Brian Kemp entering the last two years of his second and final term, we can expect a game of political musical chairs unlike anything we’ve seen in more than a decade.
Herewith, then, Trouble in God’s Country’s way too early effort at handicapping the key races. Feel free to clip it and remind me two years from now how far off base I was.
U.S. Senate seat Jon Ossoff, the incumbent Democrat who won this seat in 2020, arguably owes his seat to Donald Trump. Trump did a fine job of convincing many of his Republican supporters that Georgia was stolen from him that year through electoral shenanigans. This prompted them to stay home and not vote for the incumbent Republican (and Trump BFF) David Perdue. In ’26, the current smart money is that Ossoff will face the termlimited Kemp; the current smart money also makes Kemp the favorite going into that race. But in Georgia politics, things have a way of changing, so the really smart money is sitting back and watching this race for a while.
Governor With Kemp leaving the office, we’re likely to be treated to months of Republicanon- Republican violence as at least three potential candidates jockey for the GOP’s nomination for the state’s top job. Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones is almost certainly the early favorite over Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Attorney General Chris Carr. Jones is an uber-MAGA Trump supporter, served as one of Trump’s “alternative electors” in 2020 and will almost certainly have Trump’s backing.
Raffensperger, of course, gained national notoriety for defying then-President Trump’s demands that he “find me 11,799 votes” and then handily beat back a 2022 challenge from a Trump acolyte. His victory – along with Kemp’s brutal slaughter of former Senator Perdue in the race for the GOP nomination for governor that year – called into question just how much sway Trump had – and has – with Georgia Republicans when it comes to state races. Yeah, Republicans will vote overwhelmingly for Trump for president, but do they really want his advice when it comes to other races?
Carr, meanwhile, has long been an up-andcomer in Georgia Republican politics. A former corporate lawyer, Carr has been climbing the GOP’s political ladder for the last couple of decades. He’s undergone grooming by the likes of the late U.S. Senator Johnny Isakson and former Governor Nathan Deal, and has had his ticket punched in a broad range of jobs along the way. Among other positions, he served as Isakson’s chief of staff and Deal’s commissioner of economic development before Deal named him attorney general. He would arguably come into the race with the most impressive resume but the lowest political profile.
One way or the other, the Republican primary for governor is likely to be a showdown between the MAGA and non-MAGA wings of the Georgia GOP.
Now, whither the Democrats. It is, at this writing, difficult to imagine that Stacey Abrams will make a third run for the state’s top job– or that the third time would be the charm for her. But her departure from the party’s political stage would leave a massive vacuum in state Democratic Party politics.
Just about the only names being bandied about as a potential gubernatorial candidate are U.S. Representative Lucy McBath, who represents the state’s 7th congressional district; Jason Carter, grandson of Jimmy and Rosalynn who served in the State Senate and was the Democratic Party’s gubernatorial nominee in 2014, when he got walloped by the aforementioned Governor Deal; and outgoing DeKalb County CEO Michael Thurmond.
Thurmond, a child of sharecroppers, has won widespread praise for his work as a state legislator, state labor commissioner, superintendent of DeKalb County schools, and now head of the DeKalb County government. He would probably enter the race with the broadest political base, but his one prior venture into highlevel competitive politics was less than inspiring. He lost a 2010 challenge to Senator Isakson by nearly 20 points.
McBath, meanwhile, has been surprisingly successful in her congressional seat, but it’s difficult to imagine, frankly, that a Black woman who advocates gun control and enjoys the backing of Mike Bloomberg could parlay her congressional position into a statewide office.
The bigger question is whether the Democrats should even bother to put up a candidate for governor, and here we come to the question of voter turnout. I still haven’t been able to wrangle the state’s voting data into a usable spreadsheet but I’ve been able to plow through enough county-level data to report that predominantly Democratic counties, including major urban areas, simply didn’t turn out in sufficient numbers to give Kamala Harris a chance. Would they bother to do so for state-level Democrats running for U.S. Senate or governor? Stay tuned.
