Keisha Lance Bottoms becomes first Black woman elected governor in US
- Keisha Lance Bottoms beat Republican businessman Rick Jackson to win the Georgia governorship, US media projected.
- The former Atlanta mayor is the first Black woman elected governor of a US state and Georgia's first female governor.
- She takes over from Republican Brian Kemp in January 2027, ending decades of Republican control of the state.
Georgia has elected Keisha Lance Bottoms as its next governor, making her the first Black woman to win a state governorship in the United States, according to projections by US media.
The Democrat, a former mayor of Atlanta, defeated Republican businessman Rick Jackson in Tuesday's vote. She will also be the first woman to lead Georgia, succeeding Republican Brian Kemp, who has served the two consecutive terms state law allows.
Her win returns the governorship to the Democrats for the first time since 1998, ending more than two decades of Republican control in a state that has become one of America's tightest political battlegrounds.
According to AP News, Bottoms won even though Jackson's campaign had far more money behind it. Jackson, founder of healthcare staffing company Jackson Healthcare, ran as a political outsider promising tax cuts, tougher public safety and lighter regulation.
In her acceptance speech in Atlanta, where supporters chanted her first name, Bottoms said she would serve everyone, regardless of how they voted.
"No matter who you voted for tonight, I will be a governor for all of Georgia," she said.
She also said the result showed voters wanted a leader who would "stand up to all the chaos coming out of Washington, DC", and promised to put Georgia first.
Jackson conceded, telling his supporters: "Tonight, the voters spoke … and I respect their decision."
Who is Keisha Lance Bottoms?
Bottoms, 56, was mayor of Atlanta from 2018 to 2022, a period that covered the COVID-19 pandemic and the protests that followed the killing of George Floyd in 2020.
She later served as a senior adviser to former President Joe Biden and as director of the White House Office of Public Engagement, according to Reuters.
She takes office in January 2027. On the campaign trail she concentrated on the economy and on opposing the policies of President Donald Trump's administration, rather than on the historic nature of her candidacy.
Her victory comes eight years after Stacey Abrams became the first Black woman nominated for governor by a major US party. Abrams lost to Kemp in 2018 and 2022, but her campaigns are credited with building a broad coalition that lifted Democratic turnout in Georgia.
It was the third Georgia governor's race in a row in which a Black woman led a major party's ticket.
A big night for Black candidates
Bottoms was one of eight Black candidates nominated by major parties for governorships across the country on Tuesday.
Only three Black people, all Democratic men, had been elected governor in US history before this election.
In the US Virgin Islands, Stacey Plaskett was elected governor, becoming the first Black woman to lead a US jurisdiction. In Florida, Republican US Representative Byron Donalds won the governorship, becoming the first Black Republican elected governor in the country.
Georgia also re-elected Democrat Jon Ossoff, its first Jewish senator, who will serve alongside Raphael Warnock, the state's first Black senator.
Nigerian music star Davido, who was born in Atlanta, shared news of Bottoms' win on his Instagram Story, drawing attention to the result in his birthplace.
What happens next: Bottoms is due to be sworn in in January 2027. She will lead a state where the Atlanta area's growing population has steadily reshaped election outcomes.
