In Georgia, Republican primary for governor goes to a runoff between Trump backers

People wait in a line at a precinct before voting during a Georgia primary. Brynn Anderson/AP hide caption

Former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms won the Democratic primary for Georgia governor and will face the winner of a Republican runoff for the post, according to race calls by the Associated Press .

Bottoms served as mayor of Atlanta for one term from 2017 to 2021. She did not run for reelection and faced a tumultuous end of her term in 2020 with the COVID-19 pandemic and protests related to police use of force.

She also served in the Biden administration and received the former president's endorsement. She polled as the front runner for the Democratic nomination throughout her campaign.

In the GOP primary, Lt. Gov. Burt Jones will face off against healthcare executive Rick Jackson on June 16. The result advanced two candidates who aligned closely with President Trump over two others who had opposed his attempts to overturn Georgia's outcome in the 2020 presidential election.

Jones, who has served as lieutenant governor since 2023, is endorsed by Trump , whom he has backed since early in Trump's first run for president. Federal prosecutors investigated Jones for allegedly serving as a fake elector in a scheme to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in Georgia, but declined to charge him in 2024.

Politics

Here's how Tuesday's primary elections played out, state-by-state

While Jackson, owner of a healthcare company, is not endorsed by Trump, he has closely aligned himself with the president, and has compared himself to him as a fellow billionaire.

Jackson and Jones have spent millions of dollars on TV attack ads against each other since Jackson entered the race at the beginning of this year.

The primary tested the strength of Trump's endorsement and the MAGA base in Georgia. Trump lost Georgia by about 11,000 votes in 2020 and won the state in 2024.

Georgia, which has a Republican-controlled state government and two Democratic U.S. senators, will be a key state in November and could help decide the balance of parties in the Senate. Meanwhile the primary elections for governor serve as a temperature check for what each party's voters are prioritizing.

Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and state Attorney General Chris Carr also ran on the Republican side for governor, but did not win enough votes to advance to the runoff. Raffensperger and Carr took a less Trump-centric approach to their campaigns. Carr in campaign ads described himself as a "Brian Kemp Republican," after Georgia's Republican governor, who has at times been at odds with Trump.

Raffensperger famously butted heads with Trump in 2020, when Trump asked him to "find" about 11,000 votes to help him win the state. Carr, as attorney general, had also supported the state's vote results, which went to Joe Biden.

Georgia Republicans were also choosing their nomination for U.S. Senate to face incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff, who was unopposed for his party's nomination.

Republican Rep. Mike Collins will face former University of Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley in a runoff for the nomination, according to a race call by the AP. Trump has not made an endorsement in that race and Dooley is backed by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who has high approval ratings. Kemp has sometimes been at odds with Trump and resisted Trump's effort to overturn the 2020 vote in the state.