The Oconee County Democratic Party will hold a forum on Thursday night with candidates for three of the five races on the Democratic ballot in the June 21 runoff election.
Jessica Allison Fore and Tabitha Johnson-Green, candidates for the Democratic Party nomination for U.S. House District 10, have agreed to participate.
Dee Dawkins-Haigler and Bee Nguyen, candidates for the party’s nomination for Secretary of State, also will join.
Charlie Bailey, candidate for the party’s nomination for Lieutenant Governor, has agreed to participate, but Kwanza Hall, also seeking the nomination, has not. (Hall agreed to participate as of 1:46 p.m. on 6/13/2022.)
Fore received the second most votes in the May 24 Democratic Party Primary, but Phyliss Hatcher, who received 137 fewer votes, has asked for a recount, and as of Sunday night, the Secretary of State Office has not given a final report on the recount.
The Republican Party has two races on the June 21 ballot, for Oconee County School Board Post 3, with Ryan Hammock and Julie Mauck seeking the nomination, and for U.S. House District 10, with Mike Collins and Vernon Jones in the runoff.
The Oconee County Republican Party had scheduled a forum for June 6 but cancelled that gathering because of scheduling conflicts.
Early voting will run from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday of this week at the Elections and Registration Office, 10 Court Street, across from the Courthouse in Watkinsville.
Democratic Forum
The Democratic Forum on Thursday night will be held in-person at the Oconee County Chamber of Commerce, 55 Nancy Drive, in Watkinsville.
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| Democratic Flier |
It also will be possible to participate in the forum remotely via Zoom, at https://tinyurl.com/June16CandidateForum.
Questions can be submitted in advance to PamTDavis54@gmail.com.
The District 10 candidates will appear first, followed by the Secretary of State candidates, and then the Lieutenant Governor candidate.
Each candidate will have a chance to make introductory comments before taking questions from the audience.
Pam Davis, Secretary and Special Events Chairwoman for the Oconee County Democratic Party, said each candidate will have a chance to respond to each question asked and time will be given for rebuttal.
May 24 Results
Johnson-Green, a nurse from Washington County, was the top vote getter in the 18-county 10th District and in Oconee County, with 42.0 percent of the vote and 36.9 percent of the vote respectively. Johnson-Green was the nominee in the old 10th Congressional District in 2018 and 2020, losing to Republican Jody Hice both times.
Fore, who is a realtor and worship leader from Athens, received 19.2 percent of the vote in the state and 28.7 percent of the vote in Oconee County in the May 24 election.
Dawkins-Haigler received 18.7 percent of the vote across the state and 13.9 percent in Oconee County in the Secretary of State rate. Dawkins-Haigler is a minister from Lithonia.
Nguyen received 44.3 percent of the vote in the state and 61.1 percent in Oconee County. Nguyen is a non-profit executive in Atlanta.
Bailey received 17.6 percent of the vote in the state and 31.8 percent in Oconee County in the Lieutenant Governor race, while Hall received 30.1 percent in the state and 16.1 percent in Oconee County.
Charlie Bailey is an attorney from Atlanta. Hall is a businessman from Atlanta.
Democrats also will decide on Insurance Commissioner and Labor Commissioner in the runoff.
Raphael Baker and Janice Laws Robinson are the Insurance Commissioner candidates, and William Boddie Jr., and Nicole Horn are the candidates for Labor Commissioner.
Recount
Hatcher, from Rockdale County, asked for a recount in the U.S. 10th Congressional District Democratic race after the final tally put her 137 votes behind Fore.
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| 10th Congressional District Map |
Rebecca Anglin, director of Elections and Registration for Oconee County, said the county had finished its recount a little after 9 p.m. on June 8. The deadline for filing the results was 5 p.m. on June 10.
The Oconee County results were unchanged, with Johnson-Green getting 467 votes, Fore getting 363, and Hatcher getting 208.
The Secretary of State web site as of Sunday evening listed 15 of the 18 counties in the 10th Congressional District as complete and certified in the runoff, Clarke County as compete but not yet certified, and Newton and Taliaferro counties as partially reported.
The data downloadable data file, however, shows only Newton County with a different number of total votes in the recount than in the original tally, suggesting all but Newton County are complete.
For the 17 counties with completed results, Fore’s count remained unchanged, while Hatcher lost four votes in Clarke County and one vote in Elbert County. She gained two votes in Henry County, for a net loss of three votes.
Newton County is one of the two counties in the 10th Congressional District split with another District, and it had 2,418 votes cast in the Democratic race in May.
Only 1,825 of those have been counted, according to the data file.
Wilkes, the other county split between districts, had only 88 votes cast in the 10th Congressional District Democratic race on May 24.
Republican Runoff
Voters who participated in a party primary on May 24 must use that same party’s ballot if they vote in the June 21 runoff.
Only 1,449 of the 12,215 Oconee County voters in the May 24 election used a Democratic ballot, with 10,677 using the Republican ballot, and 89 using the nonpartisan ballot.
The 16,940 registered voters who didn’t cast a ballot on May 24 plus the 89 who used the nonpartisan ballot can vote in either party’s primary in the June 21 runoff.
Those who opt for the Republican ballot will decide on the party’s nominee for Post 3 on the Board of Education.
Hammock, a banker, and Mauck, a realtor, took sometimes similar and sometimes different positions in responses to 16 different questions I posed to them.
Melissa Eagling has qualified to run against the winner of that race in November, but she has not yet submitted the 1,425 petitions required to get her name on the ballot as an Independent.
Amy Parrish is the Republican Party nominee for Post 2 on the Board, a position she currently holds.
Ryan Repetske has qualified as an Independent to run against her in November, but he, too, has not yet submitted petitions to get his name on the ballot.
Trucking company owner Mike Collins from Jackson and Vernon Jones, the former CEO of DeKalb County, received 15.0 percent and 17.6 percent of the Republican vote in Oconee County on May 24.
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