Democratic Fulton County Commissioner announces candidacy for Georgia Secretary of State

ATLANTA (AP) — An elected leader in Georgia’s Fulton County, who drew national attention after the 2020 election when President Donald Trump claimed without evidence that voter fraud there cost him victory in Georgia, has announced she is running to be the state’s top election official.

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Fulton County Commissioner Dana Barrett launched her campaign for Secretary of State on Thursday. She joins a Democratic primary field that already includes former Fulton County District Court Judge Penny Brown Reynolds, who had a brief reality TV career, as well as Adrian Consoneri Jr. and Cam T. Ashling.

Barrett, who was elected to the Fulton Board of Commissioners in 2022, was an outspoken part of the Democratic majority that last year refused to vote to approve two Republican candidates for the county elections board, saying their past actions made them unsuitable. Ultimately, a judge found the Board of Commissioners in civil contempt and imposed a fine of $10,000 per day until the candidates were appointed, though the ruling is currently on hold pending appeal.

At a press conference Thursday at a downtown Atlanta library, Barrett said she was running to prevent the election from being handed over “to extremists and election deniers who believe their votes are more important than yours.”

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She defended the commissioners’ decision to appeal the court order, saying she did not believe the lower court followed the law correctly, and said it was important to appeal and “keep fighting.”

“Your vote is your vote. And now they want to take that away, too,” Barrett said. “That’s why I was going to prison to protect Fulton County’s elections. That’s why I’m running to be Georgia’s next Secretary of State.”

Current Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, will run for governor this year. Republican Gabriel Sterling, who served as one of Raffensperger’s top deputies, is running to replace him. Both Raffensperger and Sterling gained national notoriety — and the ire of Trump and his supporters — when they defended Georgia’s 2020 presidential election results after Trump called Raffensperger and urged him to help “find” the votes needed to overturn Democratic President Joe Biden’s narrow win in the state.

Rounding out the Republican primary are State Rep. Tim Fleming, Vernon Jones, Kelvin King, and Vernon Jones. Fleming chaired a legislative study committee that was looking into how the state conducted its elections. Jones is a former Democratic state representative who switched parties and defended Trump and his claims of a stolen election. King is married to Janelle King, a Trump-endorsed majority member of the state elections board.