More than 1,000 Georgia Democrats meet to strategize for November election

This story has been republished through a partnership with The Current, an independent, in-depth and investigative journalism website for Coastal Georgia.

More than 1,000 Georgia Democrats gathered in Savannah Saturday for a pep rally and strategy session, brandishing their determination to put a Democrat, Keisha Lance Bottoms, into the governor’s seat for the first time in a generation and to re-elect Jon Ossoff to the U.S. Senate.

The state Democratic party’s daylong convention kicked off with speeches offering a united message: Winds of change are sweeping Georgia, driven by people fed up with the rising cost of living, job insecurities and anxieties that the American dream is slipping away.

“Something is happening in our state. The country is taking notice. This is our year,” declared Charlie Bailey, chair of the state party. Democrats, he said, are offering solutions.

Bailey set the stage for the crucial task of getting people to the polls this fall, even as he seeks to rebuild the party’s organizing strength. The party’s machinery in many, if not most, of Georgia’s 159 counties has withered, due to how long Democrats have been the minority party and to the influence wielded by voting rights and get-out-the-vote groups affiliated with former Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams in recent years.

The state party announced last week it will staff 30 field offices, 60 full-time field organizers and 100 staffers to coordinate with Democratic candidates from the top of the ballot, other statewide offices and local state lawmakers.

Enthusiasm at the convention was high, despite the absence of Georgia’s two Democratic senators: Ossoff — who is running for another six-year term — and Rev. Raphael Warnock, who won re-election in 2024. Bailey and other party officials cited “scheduling conflicts” as the reason for their absence. Neither Ossoff’s campaign or Warnock’s office responded to requests for comment.

Without their presence, the convention crescendoed into a highly produced headliner event for Bottoms, who won 58 percent of the vote in last spring’s party primary but is treading water financially compared to her billionaire rival Rick Jackson.

Jackson, a health care executive who has never run for elected office, spent more than $107 million of his own money to win the Republican primary. Earlier this week, his campaign announced it had purchased $87 million in advertising to start Saturday. In comparison, Bottom’s campaign committee ended the most recent reporting period on April 30 with $257,336.80 in the bank, having spent $1.2 million, according to campaign contribution disclosure reports on file with the state. Her campaign said it received a $1 million donation from the Democratic Governors Association after her first-round primary victory.

Bottoms spent the last three days touring Coastal Georgia, and on Thursday night in Brunswick, a majority Black town nestled among reliably Republican counties, approximately 500 people turned out to hear her promise to expand Medicaid for Georgia’s working poor adults, help veterans and bring more jobs to the region.

At the convention Saturday, Bottoms said the policies supported by “Slick Rick Jackson,” as she called the health executive, have led to immense human suffering. Under Republican state leaders, working class Georgians have had to drop health care insurance due to rising costs, hospitals have closed due to underfunding and more Georgians are losing jobs because of tariffs and inflation, she said.

Jackson, she reminded the crowd, has given at least $1 million dollars to the Trump campaign as he sought endorsements from the president.

“It is abundantly clear that he will never ever stand up for Georgians against Donald Trump,” she said. “He may be running to be Trump’s favorite governor, but I’m running to be yours.”

Before Bottoms’ took the stage, Jackson’s campaign sent emails to reporters that sought to paint the former Atlanta mayor as a dangerous radical. They pointed to her support for the writings of a progressive political writer backed by members of the far-left wing of the party and to her vows to overhaul Republican policies backed by outgoing Gov. Brian Kemp.

Earlier in the week, Jackson made a campaign stop in Camden County, a largely Republican county, where he spoke to a smaller crowd than the one who turned out for Bottoms in neighboring Glynn.

Bottoms’ message of improving the economic wellbeing for everyday Georgians resonated with the delegates who came to Savannah from all corners of the state.

As they nibbled muffins and eggs at breakfast before the plenary, more than a dozen told The Current that the overriding concern of their neighbors was the rising cost of living and that the Democratic candidates’ economic messages would draw voters to the polls.

Ace Campbell, a retired U.S. Army colonel and the second vice chairman of Muskogee County Democrats, expressed confidence in the party’s chances of winning in November. “The events this morning have been electric. It’s showing that we have a good slate of candidates that are knowledgeable in what they do, and they have the energy,” he said.

Local Democratic leaders, meanwhile, put their marks on the convention from the start.

Chatham County Commissioner Aaron “Adot” Whitely, chair of the Chatham County Democratic Party, welcomed the conventioneers. Rev. Paul Smith, senior pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Savannah and president of the Savannah chapter of the NAACP, delivered an invocation.

Savannah Mayor Van Johnson took the podium after Bailey spoke. “We’re on the edge of something great,” he said in rousing speech, bringing attendees to their feet: “Are we ready to make history? . . . Let’s make things happen.”

Amanda Hollowell, the Democratic candidate for Georgia’s 1st Congressional District, had the floor for a five-minute speech, declaring she was running on a “people first” agenda.

Running against the well-funded Republican candidate Jim Kingston, the son of longtime Coastal Georgia Congressman Jack Kingston and a favorite of the Savannah business establishment, she told the crowd that the area deserved a representative in Congress who was more than his “daddy’s name.”

Candidates for statewide office emphasized their credentials as public safety professionals, business leaders and advocates for the working class.

Tanya Miller, the Democratic candidate for Attorney General and a former homicide prosecutor, told delegates about her mother, a union worker, made unemployed by corporate greed, and grandmother grew up in the rural South.

Judge Penny Reynolds told the audience that a vote for her as secretary of state would be a vote for equality and Civil Rights. “Georgia does not belong to a few people. Georgia belongs to all of us. The right to vote is an inheritance of generations,” said Reynolds, a longtime lawyer and pastor. “America has always been its best when it provides opportunity to everyone,” she said. “We will fight with faith. We will fight with justice. We will win this thing,” she said.

Ahead of Saturday’s event, the chairman of the Georgia Republican Party derided what he called Democrats’ “out-of-touch agenda.”

“This weekend, Georgia Democrats will gather in Savannah to celebrate the very leaders and policies that have failed Georgia families,” Josh McKoon said in a statement.

“They’re asking Georgians to hand their party power so they can continue pushing their agenda of higher costs, soft-on-crime policies, and divisive social priorities. Georgians have seen what Republican leadership has delivered: stronger economic growth, safer communities, secure elections, and responsible governance.”