Republican Clay Fuller held on to former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene’s (R) U.S. House seat on Tuesday, defeating Democrat Shawn Harris in a special runoff in Georgia’s 14th Congressional District and giving the GOP one more vote in its razor-thin majority.
Harris Could Not Beat District’s GOP Tilt
Harris had led the first round of voting in March in a sprawling 17-candidate field, but he could not overcome the deep Republican lean of the northwest Georgia district.
President Donald Trump endorsed Fuller in February, backing the former district attorney who prosecuted cases across four counties to succeed Greene after she resigned in January following a rupture with the president.
Fuller Win Helps Bolster Thin Majority
A report by the Associated Press on Tuesday reveals that Fuller’s win modestly strengthens the Republican edge in the House, where the party now holds a 217-214 advantage over Democrats. Once he is sworn in, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) will still be able to lose only two Republicans on party-line votes, assuming full attendance.
The district favored Trump by about 37 points in the 2024 presidential election, according to figures cited by The Downballot, but both parties watched Tuesday’s result as a test of whether Democrats could keep outperforming in some of the reddest corners of the country. Harris, a retired Army brigadier general who also lost to Greene in 2024, won 37% in the March all-party primary, while Fuller took 35%, with the crowded Republican field splitting the conservative vote and forcing a runoff.
Iran Rhetoric Shadowed A Deep-Red Runoff
Even in this strongly Republican district, Trump’s escalating rhetoric on Iran had unnerved some GOP voters, AP reported. Earlier Tuesday, he set an 8 p.m. deadline for Iran to make a deal with the United States, warning that “a whole civilization will die tonight, never to be brought back again,” before later saying he would hold off on another strike for two weeks to allow negotiations.
Democrats still have not flipped a congressional seat this year, but they have scored a string of down-ballot gains. Reuters reported last month that a Democrat won a Florida state House district that includes Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, and Georgia Democrats flipped two Public Service Commission seats in 2025. Those results have kept Democrats arguing that, even in defeat on Tuesday, the political ground may still be shifting beneath Republicans.
Image via Shutterstock/ Consolidated News Photos
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