Key takeaways:
- Bottoms is the first Black woman elected U.S. governor and Georgia’s first woman governor.
- Donalds won in Florida, Crowley won in Wisconsin, and Moore won re-election in Maryland.
- NBC News listed Ford as Nevada’s winner; CBS News said he led by more than 70,000 votes but the race remained a toss-up.
Four Black candidates won governor’s races in Tuesday’s 2026 midterm elections, including Keisha Lance Bottoms, who became the first Black woman elected governor in U.S. history. A fifth race, in Nevada, drew conflicting reports: NBC News listed Democrat Aaron Ford among the winners, while CBS News said he led by more than 70,000 votes but that the contest remained a toss-up.
Bottoms, a former Atlanta mayor, defeated Republican Rick Jackson to become Georgia’s first woman and first Black governor. NBC News reported that Jackson, a wealthy healthcare executive, put more than $100 million of his own money into his campaign, leaving Bottoms at a substantial spending disadvantage.
Bottoms told “CBS Mornings” on Wednesday that she had been trying to tune out the results while working on her speech when her husband told her the race had been called. “He said, ‘They called it.’ And I said, ‘Called what?’ And so that’s how I knew,” she said. CBS News reported that her victory brings the number of women serving as governors nationwide to a record 17.
Republican Byron Donalds won in Florida, becoming the state’s first Black governor and the first Black Republican elected governor in the United States. Donalds was elected to the U.S. House from Florida’s 19th District in 2020. In an interview with NBC News last month, he called the historic aspect of his candidacy “very special.”
“I’m humbled to be in this position, but I think it says a lot more about the state [of Florida] than it does about me,” Donalds said.
In Wisconsin, moderate Democrat David Crowley defeated Republican Rep. Tom Tiffany, whom CBS News described as one of President Donald Trump’s top allies. Democrat Wes Moore also won a second term in Maryland. Moore became that state’s first Black governor when he was elected in 2022.
“This is exciting, because up until this moment, I was the only Black governor in America,” Moore told CBS News on Tuesday. He called the election results “a historic moment.” Before this election, Moore, Massachusetts’ Deval Patrick and Virginia’s Doug Wilder were the only Black Americans elected governor, according to NBC News. They did not serve at the same time. Former New York Gov. David Paterson, who is also Black, took office after Eliot Spitzer resigned in 2008 rather than winning election to the post.
In Nevada, Ford, the state’s attorney general since 2018, faced Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo. CBS News said a Ford victory would make him Nevada’s first Black governor and the first elected west of the Mississippi River.
Other Black candidates lost their races, NBC News reported. Democrat Jermaine Johnson lost to Republican Alan Wilson in South Carolina. Republican John James lost to Democrat Jocelyn Benson in Michigan, while Republican Lisa Demuth lost to Democrat Amy Klobuchar in Minnesota.
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