Coastal Georgia Democrats have struggled long and hard to reverse their election woes in congressional elections in Coastal Georgia.
No Democrat has won Georgia’s 1st District Congressional seat since 1990, and the party has lost the past four contests by an average of 18.6% of the vote.
At a televised debate in Georgia’s capitol on Sunday, one of the eight Democrats in this year’s open race to succeed Earl “Buddy” Carter offered a bold prescription to his fellow Democrats: Start sounding like you live in south Georgia.
“Georgia, if you thought you were listening to a congressional debate for California, me, too,” the candidate, Michael McCord, declared in the closing minutes of the one-hour debate sponsored by the Atlanta Press Club and moderated by WSAV’s Tina Tyus-Shaw.
Jokes about California are a staple at Republican gatherings in Coastal Georgia. So are fears that the Golden State’s politics and culture are subverting Georgia’s “way of life.” Therefore, it was, to say the least, unusual for a Democrat to echo a Georgia GOP talking point.
McCord’s jabs at what he called “progressive California ideas” was less about issues than about labels, style and outreach.
He and his fellow Democrats on stage — Amanda Hollowell, Joey Palimeno, Pat Wilver, Randy Zurcher — largely agreed Sunday with party messaging that America’s healthcare system is in crisis, President Trump is a menace to democracy, climate change imperils humanity’s future, and corruption that favors the nation’s rich is rampant.
Where McCord took issue with his fellow Democratic candidates was over the notion that a candidate calling themselves “progressive” (Wilver) or a “Democratic socialist” (Palimeno) could win the 1st District congressional race.
The candidate who identified Hillary Clinton as the political leader he most sought to emulate was blunt. “Progressives do not win Coastal Georgia,” he said.
For a Democrat to prevail in the 1st District, McCord argued, winning the votes of disgruntled Republicans outside Chatham and Glynn County is essential.
And to the extent that political campaigns are, in part, a battle of labels, touting “progressive talking points” to voters outside those counties “cuts off any willingness” to vote Democrat, he said.
“If your policies don’t win, don’t sell, in South Georgia, you can’t win.”
Wilver disagreed.
Citing the landslide defeats of “moderates” Wade Herring in the 2022 1st District race and Patti Hewitt’s in the race two years later, the West Point graduate and Army veteran said, “I think running as a progressive is something different. Maybe that’s something that can win.”
“We need to be pulling voters to the ballot box instead of pushing them. I think we do that with progressive policy.”
Scrambling
With the start Monday of early voting for next month’s primary, the candidates are scrambling to be one of the top two vote-getters and thus make the ballot for the expected primary runoff in June, in a contest that appears to be a four-way race between Hollowell, Wilver, McCord, and Joyce Griggs.
Hollowell took a big step toward securing a spot in the runoff last week, when she won the endorsement of Savannah Mayor Van Johnson, who said she “understands our communities, our challenges, and our opportunities” and “has the experience, the commitment, and the heart to serve.”
Seeking to thwart Hollowell’s momentum, McCord on Sunday challenged her ability to steward taxpayer money, alleging that she has been evicted five times since moving to Chatham County more than 15 years ago.
Hollowell did not dispute McCord’s account, which he alleged was based on Chatham County court records, but said at the time, she was an unemployed single mother who had “a slumlord of a landlord who made sure that if I was three days late [in paying rent], they filed an eviction notice on me.” She iss now a homeowner and her son a college graduate, she said.
Three candidates for the Democratic nomination did not participate in Sunday’s debate, in which Orlando Montoya of Georgia Public Broadcasting and Margaret Coker, editor-in-chief of The Current GA, served as panelists.
Tyus-Shaw, the debate’s moderator, said Defonsio Daniels was aiding relief efforts in wildfire-stricken south Georgia. Griggs and Sharon Stokes-Williamson also did not participate. No reason was given for their absence.
Griggs has run unsuccessfully for the congressional seat three times — twice as a Democrat and once, in 2024, as an independent. That year, she was disqualified and her name did not appear on the ballot. This year, she qualified to run as a Democrat.
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