WASHINGTON — President Trump’s endorsement carries significant weight in Republican primary races, but Tuesday’s elections across four states and the District of Columbia will put that influence to the test in some unusual ways.
In Georgia, a health care businessman named Rick Jackson has poured more than $100 million of his own money into a gubernatorial runoff campaign against Trump-backed Lt. Gov. Burt Jones. Trump endorsed Jones over a year ago and reaffirmed that support on June 8, praising Jones’ “Courage and Wisdom” in a social media post. It’s a rare situation where a massive financial advantage is being pitted directly against a presidential endorsement.
Jones came out ahead in the May 19 primary with 38% of the vote, while Jackson trailed at 33%. The runoff winner will lead one of the country’s most closely watched battleground states, and the outcome will depend on voters who didn’t support either man the first time around.
In Oklahoma, Trump jumped into a crowded Republican gubernatorial primary just two weeks ago, throwing his support behind former state Sen. Mike Mazzei. With no clear front-runner in the race, it will head to a runoff if no candidate clears a majority. Trump’s endorsement record has not been perfect — earlier this month, his preferred candidate for Iowa governor, U.S. Rep. Randy Feenstra, lost to Zach Lahn in that state’s primary.
Alabama is hosting a Republican Senate primary runoff that raises a different kind of question: what happens when Trump endorses a Washington insider? Trump is supporting U.S. Rep. Barry Moore, a three-term congressman who has vowed to be “a warrior for President Trump’s ‘America First’ agenda” in the Senate. Moore’s opponent is former Navy SEAL Jared Hudson, who is positioning himself as an anti-establishment outsider — using the same political energy that once fueled Trump’s own rise.
Since Alabama leans heavily Republican, the winner of that primary will be a strong favorite in November. The Democratic runoff features business owner Dakarai Larriett and attorney Everett Wess. The Senate seat is being vacated by Sen. Tommy Tuberville, who is now the Republican nominee for Alabama governor.
In Washington, D.C., the Democratic mayoral primary is drawing national attention. Candidate Janeese Lewis George, who describes herself as a democratic socialist, is one of the leading contenders. Her campaign has drawn comparisons to democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani’s upset win in the New York City mayoral race last year.
Trump weighed in on the D.C. race days before the primary, suggesting he might take control of the city if George wins, saying “we won’t put up with it.” George fired back, calling Trump’s comments “an attack on democracy itself.”
The president’s relationship with the nation’s capital has been a central campaign issue. Trump has deployed National Guard troops in the city’s streets and overseen significant cuts to the federal workforce, which makes up a large portion of D.C.’s economy. Some residents feel that current Mayor Muriel Bowser did not push back hard enough against the administration. George’s platform, which centers heavily on affordability, includes a pledge to “protect Home Rule” with “leaders that stand up and fight back, not shrink in the face of injustice.”
George and fellow Democrat Kenyan McDuffie, who has focused his campaign on public safety, are among seven candidates competing in D.C.’s first-ever mayoral election using ranked choice voting. Under that system, voters rank candidates by preference, and if no one receives more than 50% of first-choice votes, lower-ranked candidates are eliminated and those voters’ second choices are counted. Election officials have cautioned that the new system could push results back by several days.
The Georgia Secretary of State’s race is also on the ballot Tuesday, carrying its own historical weight. Six years ago, then-Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger refused to go along with Trump’s unsubstantiated claims of election fraud and rejected a request to “find 11,800 votes” to reverse Joe Biden’s victory in the state.
Now, with Raffensperger’s seat open for the first time since that confrontation, both Republicans in the runoff have embraced versions of Trump’s election fraud narrative. Candidate Vernon Jones — a former Democrat who switched parties and aligned with Trump — has stated he believes there were “irregularities” and “violations” in past elections and says he stands “with those who believe there was election fraud.” Three of his four main campaign platform points deal with election administration.
His runoff opponent, State Rep. Tim Fleming, has been more cautious, acknowledging “irregularities” in 2020 but insisting he’s “not running on conspiracy theories.” Nevertheless, four of the seven points on his campaign website address election management, including a pledge to “make it impossible for the Left to cheat in our elections.”
Election integrity concerns have also surfaced in California, where Trump made unsubstantiated claims that Democrats were manipulating results against a Republican gubernatorial candidate and a Republican candidate for Los Angeles mayor. Shortly after, the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles — led by a Trump appointee named Bill Essayli — announced it was opening fraud investigations tied to those races.
California is also holding a special primary Tuesday to fill the congressional seat left vacant by Eric Swalwell, who resigned from the U.S. House in April after a woman accused him of sexually assaulting her on two occasions, alleging she was too intoxicated to consent both times. Swalwell, a Democrat, denied the accusations but stepped down from Congress and dropped his campaign for California governor.
If any candidate receives more than 50% of Tuesday’s vote, they will win the seat outright. Otherwise, the top two finishers will advance to a runoff on August 18. The Democratic candidates — who are favored in the heavily Democratic district, which covers several East Bay cities — include state Sen. Aisha Wahab and Bay Area Rapid Transit director Melissa Hernandez. Wahab is considered the more progressive of the two, targeting “corporate profiteering” and calling for expanded social safety nets, while Hernandez takes a more centrist approach, emphasizing local job creation and small business support. Both candidates are also running in the regular November general election for the seat, with the winner of that race taking office next year.
