McLaurin, Parkes headed to runoff in Georgia Democratic lieutenant governor primary, CBS News projects
The race to be the Democratic Party's nominee for Georgia lieutenant governor is heading to a runoff.
No candidate received more than 50% during Tuesday's primary election, meaning that the two candidates with the largest share of the vote, state Sen. Josh McLaurin and former state Sen. Nabilah Parkes, will face off in June's runoff.
McLaurin, a resident of Sandy Springs, has been in the state Senate for 4 years. McLaurin was previously elected to the Georgia House in 2018. He's frequently spoken out against what he sees as wrongheaded Republican policies, including delivering speeches that he called "Trump Morning News," attacking the Trump administration most days of the 2025 session.
McLaurin was the roommate of now-Vice President JD Vance when both were students at Yale Law School.
Parkes was in her second term as state senator before resigning to focus on the primary. While in the Senate, she served as co-chair of the Georgia Women's Legislative Caucus. If elected, she would be the state's first Muslim lieutenant governor.
While the lieutenant governor's primary was relatively quiet on the Democratic side, the sudden switch of Parkes from running for state insurance commissioner to the race stirred things up, and turned what appeared to be a clear victory for McLaurin into a competitive contest.
The third candidate in the primary, accountant and entrepreneur Richard N. Wright, did not receive enough votes to participate in the runoff.
Wright had previously run in the 2021 election to be mayor of Atlanta, which Andre Dickens eventually won after a runoff with Felicia Moore. He had also run for state Senate in 2024, but received the lowest number of votes in that primary.
Georgia's lieutenant governor presides over Senate sessions, but senators decide how much power the official has. When senators agree, lieutenant governors can be influential. With the GOP likely to hold control over the chamber, either McLaurin or Parkes would have to work with lawmakers across the aisle to get anything done.
Whoever wins the June 16 runoff will face off against the Republican nominee in the general election in November.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
