(Georgia Recorder) — Charlie Bailey, a former attorney general and lieutenant governor candidate, was elected as chairman of the Democratic Party of Georgia Saturday, replacing Atlanta U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams.
Bailey becomes the Democratic Party of Georgia’s first full-time chair as the party intensifies its efforts to fundraise and campaign for candidates and reenergize a base after setbacks following the 2020 historic elections for U.S. Sens. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff.
President Donald Trump’s return to the White House looms large as Georgia Democrats look ahead, which fueled questions about the role of party leadership in winning close elections. Trump’s narrow Georgia win played a key role in his return to the White House this year.
In Saturday’s runoff election to lead Georgia Democrats, Bailey won 53% of the votes, with a margin of 116 votes to 98 votes, over Wendy Davis, a former Rome city commissioner and 2022 candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives.
Bailey was the Democratic nominee for attorney general in 2018 and lieutenant governor in 2022.
Several top elected Democrats endorsed Bailey, including Ossoff and U.S. Rep. Lucy McBath, a Marietta Democrat who delivered Bailey’s nomination speech on Saturday.
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The new chair said he plans to hit the ground running by raising money for key races this year and in next year’s election when Ossoff will be on the ballot. He’ll also need to focus on races for state legislative and statewide constitutional seats including governor.
Bailey will need to unite progressive and more moderate wings of Georgia’s Democratic base to get the party back in the win column.
“I only ask to be judged on my heart and on my work, and I think my work as a lawyer and in politics shows I’ve got a heart for democratic values,” Bailey said following the election. “We’re going to support all of our people and get as many Democrats elected across the state as humanly possible.”
During his campaign for party chair, Bailey has cited his experience as an attorney who represented local officials seeking to stop last-minute rule changes made by the State Election Board that might have prevented the certification of the presidential election.
Bailey finished first among a field of party chair candidates that also included Gwinnett County state Sen. Nabilah Islam Parkes, former Augusta Mayor Hardie Davis, Nakita Hemingway of Atlanta, a former Democratic nominee for Agricultural commissioner, and District 1 chairman Jay Jones from coastal Georgia, who finished third in Saturday’s election.
Bailey said that the state Democratic Party will have to win over voters by following the party’s long-held ideals for improving health care, education and the economy inequality.
Bailey said Georgia’s Republican Party is failing residents because of the closure of rural hospitals after the state GOP’s leadership resistance to full Medicaid expansion and lagging public school ratings.
“That is what they have given us, the people of Georgia,” Bailey said. “Democrats, independents, Republicans, they got full cause to be angry about that, and we’re going to make sure that they know what the Republicans have done, the choices they make, and what we stand for.”
McBath said Bailey is the right person to lead the party because he knows the ins and outs of politics while also being able to raise the millions of dollars needed for campaigning.
“I’m not going to mince words about what’s happening in D.C. right now,” McBath said. “Our democracy is truly on the line, and it’s time that Georgians stand up. It’s time that we say enough is enough.”
