Republican Clay Fuller Narrowly Wins Runoff To Replace Marjorie Taylor Greene

SEO: Georgia, Clay Fuller, Shawn Harris, midterms

On Tuesday evening, Republican District Attorney Clay Fuller won a Georgia special election runoff to serve the remainder of Marjorie Taylor Greene’s term.

According to the Washington Post, Fuller defeated Democrat Shawn Harris, a retired Army general whom Democrats hoped would pull off a dramatic upset in Georgia’s traditionally deep-red 14th District. Speaking to his supporters after his win was announced, Fuller promised he would have President Donald Trump’s “back each and every day” on Capitol Hill, and that, as “President Trump said, I will never let you down.”

While Harris ultimately fell short, there are plenty of positives for Democrats to take from the runoff election. Fuller won by just under 12 percentage points, which seems substantial until you consider that Trump won the district by 37 percentage points in the 2024 election. “They need to get behind candidates like me instead of just saying they can’t win,” Harris told the Post. Harris cited his background as a farmer, his frequent town halls, and attention to rural voters as reasons his campaign made an impact.

“Tonight, we had a big win,” Harris told The New York Times after he conceded the election. “The takeaway is this: If Democrats, independents, and Republicans can do this in a ruby-red district, the Democrats can win anywhere.”

The Fuller campaign sent a statement to the Post in response to Harris’s claims, saying, “There are no moral victories in politics. Losers don’t get to vote in Congress.” Well, that’s not true. Ted Cruz has been voting in the Senate since 2013, and I can’t think of a bigger loser. 

Fuller will serve through the remainder of Greene’s term, which ends at the end of the year. He will have to win another primary and an election this November to serve a full, two-year term. 

CNN reports that Democrats also saw several notable wins in Wisconsin on Tuesday. Judge Chris Taylor won a seat on the state’s Supreme Court, and it wasn’t even close. Taylor beat her opponent, Maria Lazar, by 20 percentage points, giving Democrats a 5-2 majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. On the city level, Democrat Alicia Halvensleben narrowly won the mayoral race in the traditionally Republican-leaning city of Waukesha.

Harris’s gains and the wins in Wisconsin are further evidence of the ongoing enthusiasm gap between Republican and Democratic voters ahead of the midterms this Fall. Democrats have been consistently overperforming in special elections since Trump took office last year. Florida, a state that’s been deep Red for much of the 21st century, has seen cities like Miami elect their first Democratic mayor in decades. Only last month did a Democrat win a special election to represent the district where Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort is located in the state legislature. 

Even in situations where Republicans win these elections, as we’ve seen with Fuller, they’re winning by much tighter margins than they’re historically used to. While it’s unsurprising that the GOP’s policies are unpopular with Democrats and independents, these shifts are showing that even Republican voters aren’t terribly enthused about the direction the United States is going under Trump’s leadership. 

Trump campaigned on lowering prices and no new wars, yet this year, he started a new war with Iran that dramatically increased food, housing, and gas prices. While Trump announced a two-week ceasefire with Iran on Tuesday, the damage done to oil processing facilities across the Middle East likely means that gas prices are still going to be high for the immediate future. While the Strait of Hormuz is ostensibly open, there’s still uncertainty whether that’s going to be the case in two weeks. As we saw during the pandemic, disruptions to the global supply chain generally have long-tail economic consequences. 

With the GOP largely focused on doing everything but helping working-class Americans, it’s unsurprising that their prospects are only growing bleaker as we approach the midterm elections. 

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