ATLANTA — Keisha Lance Bottoms is projected to become the next governor of Georgia and the nation’s first Black woman governor, according to Decision Desk HQ.
Bottoms took the stage Tuesday night in front of a boisterous crowd waving “Madam Governor” signs.
“Georgia has always been a state where we didn’t settle for what was before us, but we have always fought for better,” Bottoms said. “In acts big and small, we all have the ability to shape our future. That is the legacy that we have in Georgia. It’s the legacy that comes with responsibility, and it is that responsibility that I will take to the governor’s office.”
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Bottoms, the former mayor of Atlanta, prevailed in one of the most competitive races of the cycle in a state that helped elect President Donald Trump just two years ago. She took on Republican Rick Jackson, a billionaire healthcare executive who flooded the race with his wealth, contributing more than $200 million to his own bid.
Bottoms ran on promises to take on the rising cost of living. She promised to give municipalities the option of doing away with grocery taxes as well as taxes on diapers, baby formula and feminine hygiene products. She also proposed to do away with the state’s tax on car insurance premiums and homeowner’s insurance, and to lower the state’s gas tax.
Bottoms also promised to expand Medicaid, a longtime goal for Democrats in the state. She said she wanted to create a pathway to free technical education and community college in the state, and vowed to pause the construction of new data centers in Georgia.
Bottoms campaigned as a mom with a working-class background and generations of Georgia roots, sharing with voters the impact of her father’s incarceration and her mother’s years as the owner of a hair salon.
She rarely talked about the history-making potential of her campaign, and the potential to give Black women unprecedented representation at the state level in Georgia, but also a seat at the table at the National Governors Association and the Democratic Governors Association, powerful political organizations that have never had a Black woman in their ranks.
The historic nature of her campaign — not just in Georgia but the entire country — was not lost on the ground. Before her speech, the crowd danced along to a mix of decade-spanning hip-hop and classic R&B. When the DJ played “Got to Be Real” by Cheryl Lynn, Delta Sigma Thetas in the crowd let out a sea of “oo-oop!”
When R&B singer Tyrese asked people to join an acapella rendition of the Sam Cooke standard “A Change is Going to Come,” people wiped away tears as they sang.
The high level of enthusiasm for U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, who won his reelection bid, also helped lift Bottoms and the rest of the Democratic ticket. Ossoff, Bottoms and downballot Democrats regularly campaigned together under the slogan, “United for Georgia.”
At her election night party, Bottoms recognized Ossoff, who cruised to reelection Tuesday.
“You voted for the whole ballot energy and reelected my friend Jon Ossoff,” said Bottoms, noting that the state now has a Democratic governor and two Democratic senators.
In her campaign, Bottoms emphasized the importance of this election on Black voting rights, which she vowed to protect from federal and state-level attacks. Looming over Black Georgians is the potential for redistricting, made possible by the U.S. Supreme Court’s April ruling weakening key provisions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Republican leaders shelved a plan to redraw the state’s political maps backed by current GOP Gov. Brian Kemp, but some Democrats believe Republicans are simply putting it off until after the election to avoid voter backlash.
For many Black women in Georgia, Bottoms’ election is a milestone that resonates with them and sends a message about the direction of their state and their country.
While Bottoms rarely directly addressed that yearning, in one of the final speeches of the cycle, she asked voters to visualize her journey as a young Black girl to the state’s top job.
“I was recently asked if I always wanted to be the governor of Georgia, and the answer is no. But I vividly recall those rare days when my grandmother didn’t ride the bus home from her job at Davison’s department store in Lenox, and the excitement I had when my mother would pick her up from work. We’d leave our home on the west side of Atlanta early, so that we could take the long streetway into Buckhead, and the most exciting part of that drive for me was passing the governor’s mansion,” Bottoms said during a rally in Morrow, Georgia.
“I remember looking at it as we drove by and saying, ‘I want to go in there one day.’”
“But 50 years later, I will not just walk into the governor’s mansion, but the state capital as well, bringing with me the hopes and dreams of little boys and girls all across Georgia who are counting on their governor to make decisions about their future that will make all things possible.”
More than an hour before the official election results watch party for Bottoms was set to begin, supporters had begun to line up in droves inside the Marriott Marquis in downtown Atlanta, many of them in official Bottoms shirts, others in homemade accessories celebrating the campaign. The energy level was high and the excitement was palpable; it was clear that people wanted to be in the room if and when history was made.
Linda Lewis, 62, traveled to Atlanta from Chicago to attend the watch party; she said Bottoms is her cousin. “It’s been a fight,” Lewis said of the campaign — adding that Bottoms was actively trying to counter misinformation. “I feel positive. I feel real positive.”
Valerie Wilson of Atlanta described herself as “65 years young.” She was at the watch party because she “wanted to be a part of history being made, and to be able to tell my grandkids” that she had been a part of making it possible. “We gotta have her,” Wilson said of Bottoms. “I like what she’s planning to do for us and I think she’s really the only option. She got to be it for us.”
Wilson said her top issue this election was expanding Medicaid; she has a grandson with special needs and is concerned about his not being able to get care without this coverage. She also said she hoped to see universal Pre-K programs implemented in the state. Waiting for the results to come in, Wilson said she was “praying really, really hard that this goes the way it’s supposed to go.” If Bottoms did not win, she said, she would be “distraught.”
Jackson attacked Bottoms’ record as mayor of Atlanta throughout the cycle, criticizing her handling of the 2020 unrest following the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. “As Mayor, Keisha Lance Bottoms LET ATLANTA BURN,” a Jackson flier read.
Jackson ran on promises to cut the state’s income tax and use his business experience to bring in new jobs. Jackson appealed to voters by describing his journey from a child in an unstable home and eventually foster care to a prolific career in business.
Jackson’s bid was bolstered by Kemp’s popularity as the sitting governor, but Trump was also an anchor on Jackson, who tried to distance himself from the president in the final months of the election. Trump’s unpopularity this cycle, largely driven by voters’ anger at the impact of his policies on the cost of gas and food, made for an ultracompetitive race in a state that favored him in 2024.
Quantavius Foster, 35, drove in from Swainsboro in southwest Georgia, a nearly three-hour trip by car. “What brings me here tonight is the one and only good in the hood, Keisha Lance Bottoms,” Foster said. Foster said she attended a Bottoms rally earlier this year in Statesboro and was moved by Bottoms’ story of her upbringing.
“There were no cameras rolling or anything, and it just showed me the genuineness that she has, so she deserved my support and everyone else’s support.”
Foster said she hopes that Bottoms will be a “bridge over troubled water,” someone able to “set the tone for both parties and individuals.”
Mariel Padilla contributed to this report.
