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TWITTER / BEE NGUYEN Bee Nguyen, candidate for Georgia Secretary of State, thanks her supporters on election night. |
An Asian American rising star in Georgia politics won a runoff position after winning 44% of the primary vote last May 24.
Bee Nguyen won less than the 50% needed for an outright victory, but she garnered the most votes among Democrats running for Secretary of State. She will run off against the second-runner up, former state Rep. Dee Dawkins-Haigler who won 19% of the Democrats' votes.
The winner of the Democrats' run-off on June 21 will face Republican incumbent Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Libertarian Ted Metz in the November general election.
A day after the primary, Nguyen garnered a key endorsement that pretty much wraps up the support of the Democratic mainstream.
“When Bee was elected to my former House seat, I knew my constituents would be well represented. Now, her record of advocacy and public service for Georgia voters speaks for itself,” said Stacey Abrams, who won her own primary election for governor. She will face off against incumbent Republican Gov. Brian Kemp.
Nguyen,40, is the daughter of Vietnamese refugees. She grew up in Augusta, Georgia and graduated from a Georgia public high school.
After she moved to Atlanta to attend Georgia State University, she started a local nonprofit to educate and empower young women. She spent a decade in Georgia public high schools, where she learned how to organize with her community and demand change for her students.
Nguyen made history when she was elected as the first Asian American Democratic woman to the Georgia General Assembly in House District 89, the seat formerly held by Abrams. At the Georgia State Capitol, Nguyen is a leading advocate for voting rights, public education, and criminal justice reform.
Nguyen's victory for Abram's seat in a runoff made her the first Asian American woman in the Georgia General Assembly. But Nguyen grabbed the national spotlight in December 2020 when a video of her methodical and public takedown of election fraud claims by Trump allies went viral.
In its endorsement of Nguen, the AAPI Victory Fund stated:
"At a time when democracy itself is under attack, there can be no more important priority than to ensure that every vote counts and that the people in charge of counting the votes do so with integrity. In this year’s midterm elections, our focus must be on critical Secretary of State races, especially in Georgia where a Republican governor has made clear his intention to limit access to the ballot as part of a craven attempt to win his own re-election.
“Representative Nguyen gained invaluable mentorship experience through a local non-profit she founded to educate and empower young women and, over the decade she spent in the Georgia public school system, knows firsthand the best practices to organize and spark change for her community. Throughout her career, Representative Nguyen has been a leading advocate for voting rights, public education and criminal justice reform. By the end of her first term on the Georgia General Assembly, Representative Nguyen successfully overturned the “exact match” voter registration law, which subsequently restored the right to vote for over 53,000 voters impacted by the restrictive voting policy. Georgia deserves a champion for democracy and ... will position the state of Georgia as a leader in our country for voting rights."
As Secretary of State, the winner will oversee Georgia's elections in the 2024 Presidential race. Georgia's votes were embroiled in controversy as Donald Trump tried to get Raffensperger to overturn the state's votes, which went to eventual winner Joe Biden, the first time the state voted for a Democrat in 30 years.
In the aftermath of Democratic victory, the Republican-controlled legislature passed sweeping changes to voting rules — actions that Nguyen and other critics say are aimed at dampening the record turnout from 2020 that helped turn Georgia blue.
"This race is about defending the freedom to vote," Nguyen said during a campaign stop. "It is about protecting the future of our democracy."
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