Live Commentary
1:08pm With 99% reporting, Dem Harris wins 37.3% and Rep Fuller 34.9%, with another Rep the next highest at 11.6%. Two other Dems combined for 2.4%, for a Dem total of 39.7%. That’s a more than eight-point swing to the Dems from the 2024 Trump and Harris vote shares, but Fuller should easily win the April 7 runoff.
11:51am While Dem Harris won 43% of the early in-person vote, he’s so far only winning 27% of the election day vote. With 75% overall reporting, Harris’ share of the overall vote has fallen to 38.0%, with two other Dems combining for 2.4%.
11:32am With 61% reporting, Dem Harris and Rep Fuller have been called as advancing to an April 7 runoff, with current vote shares of 39.9% Harris and 34.2% Fuller. There’s more votes outstanding in Dem favouring counties.
11:03am With all counties in Georgia 14 reporting some results and 49% counted overall, Dem Harris has 42.3% and Rep Fuller 33.1%. Election day votes will likely favour Reps, so the Dems won’t do as well as the current massive swing towards them suggests. This seat voted for Trump by 68.2-31.3 in 2024.
10:44am With 33% in, Dem Harris has taken the lead with 44.3%, followed by Rep Fuller at 33.6%. The other two Dems combined are only at 2.3%. Early votes will likely favour Dems relative to the final results.
10:24am With 3% reporting, Rep Fuller has 43.4% and Dem Harris 34.5%, with the next highest two Reps at 8.3% and 6.9% respectively. Fuller and Harris are likely to go to a runoff unless Fuller wins outright with over 50% today
Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here.
Polls close at 10am AEDT today for a jungle primary federal special election in Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene’s former Georgia 14 seat after she resigned on January 5. At a jungle primary, many Republicans and Democrats compete, and the top two, regardless of party, go to a runoff, unless one candidate wins over 50%. If needed, the runoff will be on April 7.
There are 16 Republican and three Democratic candidates. As well as who makes the top two, I will follow how well Republicans and Democrats do overall. At the 2024 presidential election, Donald Trump defeated Kamala Harris in Georgia 14 by 68.2-31.3, a 36.9-point margin. At the 25 state special elections held so far in 2026, Democrats have performed on average 10.9 points better than the Trump vs Harris margin in those same seats.
Republicans hold a 218-214 House of Representatives majority with two other vacancies. A special election in New Jersey’s 11th will occur on April 16 after Democrat Mikie Sherill was elected NJ governor in November 2025. The Republican member for California’s first died in early January, with the special to be held on August 4.
In Nate Silver’s aggregate of US national polls, Trump’s net approval is -13.6, virtually unchanged from when the Iran war started. While the war had caused skyrocketing oil prices, they fell back Monday on speculation Trump would chicken out. In Silver’s aggregate of the generic ballot, Democrats lead Republicans by 5.3 points, with this margin little changed in the last six weeks. Midterm elections occur this November.
In gerrymandering news, the Virginia Supreme Court overturned a lower court decision, thus clearing the way for an April 21 referendum. A “yes” vote at the referendum will implement a 10-1 Democratic gerrymander of Virginia’s 11 federal House seats, a four-seat gain for Democrats. There have been two referendum polls so far, with “yes” leading by eight points in one, while “no” leads by eight in the other.
Upcoming Danish and Hungarian elections
Of the 179 Danish MPs, 175 are elected in Denmark and two each in Greenland and Faroe Islands by proportional representation with a 2% threshold. The March 24 election was called eight months early. Polls have the current government of centre-left A and two more conservative parties facing defeat, but the overall vote for left-wing parties (Red bloc) is usually ahead of that for right-wing parties (Blue bloc).
Of the 199 Hungarian MPs, 106 will be elected by first past the post and the remaining 93 by national proportional representation with a 5% threshold. Since the 2022 election, the conservative and pro-European Tisza has become the main challenger to Viktor Orbán’s governing far-right Fidesz. Owing to pro-Fidesz gerrymandering, Tisza is expected to need a 3-5 point lead in the popular vote to win a majority of seats.
Polls for the April 12 election are contradictory. Pollsters allied with Fidesz give Fidesz leads, but independent or opposition-allied pollsters give Tisza large leads. At the 2022 election, polls were not contradictory, but they all understated Fidesz’s margin over the then opposition United for Hungary alliance by at least six points.
Nepalese and German state elections
An election occurred in Nepal last Thursday after the previous government collapsed in September 2025 following student-led protests about its authoritarian tendencies and nepotism. Of the 275 seats, 165 were elected by FPTP and 110 by national PR with a 3% threshold. The reformist Rastriya Swatantra Party won 125 of the 165 FPTP seats. With proportional seats now allocated, they won 47.9% of the national vote and 182 of the 275 total seats.
German elections effectively use PR with a 5% threshold. At Sunday’s state election in Baden-Württemberg, the Greens won 56 of the 157 seats (down two since 2021), the conservative CDU 56 (up 14), the far-right AfD 35 (up 18) and the centre-left SPD ten (down nine). The Left party and the pro-business FDP missed the 5% threshold, with each winning 4.4%, as the FDP lost its 18 seats. The only coalition capable of reaching the 79 seats needed for a majority that doesn’t include the AfD is a Greens/CDU coalition.
Love a Jungle primary… I always get the song “Jungle Boogie” in my head.
I doubt that any one candidate will get over 50%. Shawn Harris should get the bulk of the democratic votes and probably will end up in the final two. On the Republican side, it is a real mixture – Colton Moore and Jim Tully are the better chances but someone else could end up in front.
Thanks Adrian. Appreciate the detailed commentary.
My bold prediction: Two democrats win the jungle primary.
~58% R vote split 16 ways vs 42% D vote split 3 ways.
The Repbulicans are hardly in a position to unify behind a small number of candidates. Despite their total vote lead, they’ll lose it
Adrian Beaumont
Okay this a wild primary. Currently, with over 50% counted, Democrat is leading with about 39.9% and the leading Republican Fuller has 38.4%
It appears they both go to run off.
My question to you is, what happens after the run off on April 14. The winning candidate will contest in general election. But will the winning candidate doesn’t have any opposition in general election?
Ven – whoever wins the run off on 7th April will become the new Congressperson for GA-14, until next election for the seat as part of the mid-terms in November. Given that it’s normally a Republican-leaning seat, but that the Dems did very well in this Special (and seem highly likely to do well in the general), it’s a sure thing that both parties will compete in November. Before the general, there will be another primary to decide the candidate, though presumably the winning candidate in April will be the standard bearer for their party.
This is an extraordinary result in GA-14. My best guess is that Fuller (R) will end up winning the run-off, as presumably the large gaggle of other Republican candidates will swing in behind the “R” candidate when push comes to shove. But of course it will be a Special election, usually characterised by low turn-out, and thus prone to very wonky results. I wouldn’t say that the Democratic win in April is completely out of the question, notwithstanding the strong Republican lean of the district.
Even if Fuller ends up winning, say 55/45 in the run-off, that’s still something like a 13-point change from 2024, a swing largely in line with other special and other elections across the nation over the last 6 months. Everything is still pointing a big blue wave in November.
Thanks Hugo. Got it. I forgot for a moment this is special election. It appears my knee replacement surgery drugs are fogging my mind.
I must have been off my oats this morning as I knew Fuller was the most likely. Looks like the runoff will be Republican win. Harris only had a chance if there was a low turnout on the right side of the equation in the jungle primary.
Yeah, it’s probably a long-shot of the Democrats flipping Georgia-14.
It seems like the equivalent of the Australian division of Hume, only taking in parts of the outer suburbs of Atlanta before stretching into rural blood-red Georgia.
Still though, a swing like that of 8 points would flip at least 40 other Republican seats to Democrats.
Elsewhere in the USA I’m getting more concerned about the Senate race in Maine, namely from this new poll from Quantus Insights.
https://quantusinsights.org/f/maine-senate-2026-collins-faces-uncertain-path-to-re-election#ddfaccf9-bede-412a-8ce9-6f9ddda07554
Democratic Primary (9 June): Graham Platner: 43%, Janet Mills 38%
General Election (vs Republican Susan Collins),
Platner: 49%, Collins 42%
Mills: 43%, Collins 45%
The trouble with these numbers and commentary I’ve seen on social media is that a lot of Democrats actively despise the other opponent, to the point that “vote Blue no matter who” wouldn’t matter, so that Collins can sneak in for another 6-year term if Platner and Mills voters decide they’d rather sabotage the other than unite.
“. . . skyrocketing oil prices, they fell back Monday on speculation Trump would chicken out.”
Strange (and certainly not non-partisan) characterisation of the various options (and combinations of actions) emerging to secure global oil supplies.
Clearly Adrian Beaumont reads pretty left-wing news sources for that to be considered a ‘par for the course’ description in a neutral article!
60.3%-39.7% = 20.6% margin
It may change in the April 7 run-off, but if it doesn’t that’s a 16.3% drop in margin for the GOP, so higher than Adrian’s reported average 10.9% betterment for Dems in by-elections so not good for GOP at all – though MTG’s shadow may have affected some of this, idk.
omg BTSays, not sure if you noticed but your boy Trump is a pants-shitting TACO vermiform parasite with multiple accusations of being a pedophile, so saying he might chicken out is pretty mild and neutral really.
MTG share of the vote was already much lower than what Trump got in the district – that is there were plenty of Republicans who were voting for Trump but not MTG. Thus, there was certainly a swing if measured against Trumps vote share, less so if measured against MTG vote share.
BTsays, that’s from Nate Silver. It’s “Trump Always Chickens Out (TACO)”, which means that if the stock market slumps because of something Trump is doing, then Trump will moderate his actions. We had this already after the April 2025 “Liberation Day” tariffs.
On the topic of US Jungle Primaries, an Emerson poll has been released for the California Governor on 2 June.
https://emersoncollegepolling.com/california-2026-poll-swalwell-takes-lead-in-governor-primary-25-undecided-election-for-la-mayor-wide-open/
Looking like things are moving toward Eric Swalwell (D) against Steve Hilton (R).
Last month there was a danger that the Democrats would flood each other out so the actual contest in November would be a choice between 2 Republicans, Steve Hilton and Chad Bianco, but it appears that the Democrats are solidifying around a frontrunner.
BS Fairman 9.58am
Salutary point, surprised not given by Adrian. What was MTG result 2024?
And @Adrian Beaumont, do you have the average swing of the 25 prior by-elections vs. the 2024 results in those House races?
@William Bowes
I know you moderate with a light touch, but regardless of the unpopularity round here of DJT, surely Omar Comin’ 11.57pm crosses the Rubicon?
While I have never met the man, apparently I have a familial connection to Georgia Senator Ossoff, who himself has that connection to Australia.
Polling has him up at the moment, and MGT gone maybe the Maga high water mark has passed.
Kirsdarke, the online commentary about the Maine senate race is almost entirely divorced from the voters. I wouldn’t worry about Democrats in the state getting behind either candidate. What will matter is how much crossover appeal to independents the candidate will have and so far Platner appears to be well placed there.
BTsays, all the info on state special elections so far in 2026 is at the link in my article to the Downballot.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1JGk1r1VXnxBrAIVHz1C5HTB5jxCO6Zw4QNPivdhyWHw/edit?gid=1173601967#gid=1173601967
It’s now an average swing from the Trump/Harris margin of 11.1 points to Dems after Dems gained a Rep-held state seat in New Hampshire on Tuesday.
The jungle primary in Georgia 14 won’t count as they only count races with one Dem and one Rep candidate. But the April 7 runoff will count.