Midterm elections are notoriously under-attended, but Georgia’s voters turned out for the only statewide race in the 2025 cycle. The Public Safety Commission races for Districts 2 and 3 turned blue last night.
Alicia Johnson defeated incumbent Tim Echols, and Peter Hubbard won his contest with incumbent Fitz Johnson. Both Ms. Johnson and Hubbard are Democrats, and heavily focused on lowering utility costs for their constituents during their campaigns. On Tuesday, Nov. 4, the voters voted overwhelmingly for both. Ms. Johnson won 62% of the vote, while Hubbard did the same.
The ongoing government shutdown had to play a part in the way Georgia voters cast their votes for the public safety commission seats. According to data from the Secretary of State Office, Johnson (977,613) and Hubbard (979,335) received nearly 980,000 votes.
Locally, Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens won a second term with 86% of the vote, while Atlanta City Councilwoman Marci Collier Overstreet won the council president seat over challenger Rohit Malhotra. The election was close. Overstreet, a longtime member of the Atlanta City Council, won just 51.36% of the vote.
Nationally, there was a similar shift and quite possibly a change in political tone for 2026 with the elections of the first female governor in Virginia, the first Muslim Mayor in New York City, the first female mayor in the history of Detroit, and a new leader in New Jersey’s governor’s mansion.
Democratic candidate Abigail Spanberger was overwhelmingly elected as the first female governor of Virginia on Tuesday night. Spenberger was endorsed by former United States President Barack Obama. Mary Sheffield was elected the first female mayor of Detroit in hundreds of years. A Democrat, Sheffield, may have won a local election, but set the tone for the evening’s shift towards female leadership around the country.
Zoran Mamdani will be the first Muslim Mayor of New York City when he is inaugurated at the beginning of the new year. Mamdani, self-described as a Democratic socialist, was also endorsed by Obama.
The Proposition 50 ballot referendum in California passed with nearly 64% of the vote. The ballot measure will redraw the state’s congressional map in favor of Democrats.