Billionaire Rick Jackson snagged the Republican nomination in the Georgia Governor’s Race over Lt. Gov. Burt Jones (R) during Tuesday’s GOP runoff election.
NBC News projected Jackson as the winner over Jones a little over two hours after polls closed in the Peach State, with nearly 82 percent of votes counted. When the outlet called the race, Jackson led Jones 52.9 percent to 47.1 percent.
Jackson and Jones, who was endorsed early on by President Donald Trump, competed in a runoff after neither candidate received over 50 percent of the votes in the May 19 Republican primary. In the primary, Jones narrowly beat Jackson 38.4 percent to 32.5 percent, edging out Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr.
Jackson, a healthcare executive and first-time candidate, is reported to have dumped more than $100 million of his own money into his campaign. He jumped into the race six months after Jones did, catching up by leaps and bounds and ultimately dashing Jones’s chances this cycle, despite the Trump endorsement and a last-minute endorsement from Gov. Brian Kemp (R).
Jackson, who has painted himself as a political outsider much like Trump, will now face Democratic nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms in the November general election in a state that has become increasingly purple.
President Trump’s pick for the Republican Georgia U.S. Senate candidate, Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA), did secure a victory over Kemp-backed former football coach Derek Dooley, and will face incumbent Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) in November.
Katherine Hamilton is a political reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on X @thekat_hamilton.
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