Georgia, Oregon, Idaho and Kentucky primaries 2024: Willis, McAfee win; tough night for progressives

Abortion didn’t help liberals flip a Georgia Supreme Court seat.

On May 21, voters in Georgia, Idaho, Oregon, Kentucky and California held key elections for Congress and nationally watched local races. Two key figures from one of Trump’s legal cases, Fani Willis and Scott McAfee, easily won their races, while conservatives won a Georgia Supreme Court election fought largely over abortion. In the House, progressives lost two key races in Oregon, while California voters picked a successor to Kevin McCarthy.

As usual, 538 reporters and contributors broke down the election results as they came in with live updates, analysis and commentary. Read our full live blog below.


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The rise of electability

Nathaniel, I think a particularly interesting subset of that conversation surrounds the concept of "electability" — when a voter casts a ballot for a candidate in a primary based not on whether they agree with their policy positions but whether they think that other voters will want to vote for that person over the alternative. That's a big part of the race in Oregon's 5th District, where one side has been making a pretty explicit electability case against the other candidate based on her loss in the 2022 race and damaging stories that have come out since. And of course Biden benefited heavily from the electability argument in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries (which, in my mind, is a big part of why he's struggled so mightily to keep his coalition together). But I think it's a little reductive to shove that all in with vibes. Voters who cast their ballots informed by electability concerns are actually trying to do something pretty sophisticated! Whether or not they're any good at it is another question ...

—Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections


Should we really care what voters say they prioritize?

Mary, your post about what issues were most important to Oregonians reminded me of a post I read from political scientist John Sides today. He wrote up a study that found that voters didn't really vote for the candidate they perceived as better on the issues they claimed to care about. Basically, voters aren't making a linear, rational calculation of "which candidate is better on which issue?" Instead, a lot of the time, it's just vibes.

—Nathaniel Rakich, 538


Oregon voters care about good governance

When asked what the most pressing issue in America is, Oregon voters were most likely to select "government leadership" from a list of issues in an April poll from The Bullfinch Group/The Independent Center. Twenty percent of registered voters surveyed selected the issue, more than in any other state included in the Pacific states survey. While we haven't seen a similar outcome in issue polls of other states so far this cycle, it's also fairly uncommon for pollsters to include the issue when this type of question is asked. However, even in other states in the survey with similar partisanship as Oregon, such as California, voters were less focused on governance (just 9 percent of California voters selected the issue as the most pressing) and more focused on the kinds of issues we've seen in other states: immigration and the economy.

The next most chosen issues for Oregon voters were "jobs and the economy" (14 percent), immigration (11 percent) and abortion (8 percent). Seven percent of Oregon voters selected each of "energy and the environment," health care, and national security.

—Mary Radcliffe, 538


Today’s EMILYs List endorsements

We've been tracking candidates this cycle who have earned an endorsement from EMILYs List, the prominent political action committee formed to elect pro-choice Democratic women. In today's congressional primaries, EMILYs has endorsed four women — three in Oregon, and one in Georgia. In Georgia, incumbent Rep. Lucy McBath secured their endorsement, and as we mentioned earlier, she's the projected winner of her primary in the 6th District.

In Oregon, two incumbents who are seen as targets for Republicans in November earned EMILYs List endorsements: Rep. Val Hoyle in the 4th District and Rep. Andrea Salinas in the 6th. In addition to these incumbents, EMILYs List endorsed state representative Janelle Bynum in Oregon's 5th District. Bynum is facing attorney Jamie McLeod-Skinner; McLeod-Skinner was Democrats' nominee in 2022, when she lost the general election by less than 3 points. Polls are still open in most of Oregon, so we will have to wait and see how this race shakes out.

—Meredith Conroy, 538 contributor


That’s a wrap!

With all of tonight's key races now projected, it's time for us to hit the hay. Here's a recap of who won today:

- Despite trying to ride the wave of voter activation over abortion, former Democratic Rep. John Barrow failed to unseat Republican-appointed Justice Andrew Pinson in the only contested race for Georgia Supreme Court today.

- Challenges to a pair of major figures in Trump's Georgia election-interference case also went nowhere. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis easily won her Democratic primary, and Judge Scott McAfee won his judicial election against a self-described "conservative Democrat."

- The Republican primary in Georgia's 3rd District is going to a June 18 runoff between longtime Trump staffer Brian Jack and former state Senate Majority Leader Mike Dugan.

- In Georgia's 13th District, incumbent Rep. David Scott prevailed over his six challengers to win his Democratic primary and will go on to seek reelection in November. Scott's challengers tried to focus on his age and health as an issue, echoing criticisms facing the Democrats and President Joe Biden in November, but incumbency proved too powerful an advantage.

- Out west, the DCCC got their candidate in Oregon's 5th District, as state Rep. Janelle Bynum easily dispatched attorney Jamie McLeod-Skinner, who lost in 2022 in this seat against Republican Rep Lori Chavez-DeRemer. Bynum will face off against Chavez-DeRemer this November.

- In Oregon's 3rd District, state Rep. Maxine Dexter benefited from a plethora of outside spending to defeat former Multnomah County Commissioner Susheela Jayapal in the Democratic primary, all-but-ensuring that Dexter will be this dark-blue seat's next representative.

- Republican Mike Erickson will get a third shot at winning a House seat as he cruised to victory in the GOP primary for Oregon's 6th District. At times, Erickson seems more focused on winning a defamation case against Rep. Andrea Salinas regarding an ad she aired last cycle against him than he does on beating her in an election.

- In Idaho's 2nd District, incumbent Republican Mike Simpson is poised to win his primary and likely reelection this fall. With more than 60 percent of the votes counted, he leads his closest challenger, investment adviser Scott Cleveland, 57 percent to 34 percent. (Scott Cleveland is a great quarterback name, now that this politics thing doesn't seem to be working out.)

- In the special election in California's 20th District (former Speaker Kevin McCarthy's old seat), Assemblyman Vince Fong defeated fellow Republican Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux. As a result, Speaker Mike Johnson will soon get an extra vote in the House.

—Monica Potts, Nathaniel Rakich, Kaleigh Rogers and Geoffrey Skelley, 538; Jacob Rubashkin, Inside Elections