Welcome to a special edition of At the Races! Throughout the 2026 primary season, watch for these updates from the CQ Roll Call campaign team on what you need to know for election day. Know someone who’d like to get this newsletter? They can subscribe here.
It’s primary day again, with a little less action than last week, but with something for both parties between elections we’re watching in Mississippi and Georgia.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee, faces a challenge from 34-year-old Evan Turnage, a former Senate staffer who argues it’s time for change in the 2nd District.
“The same old way has not been working. It hasn’t been working for the district. This is still the poorest district in the poorest state, and it’s been that way for my entire life, and we need a new sort of approach for representation in Congress for this district,” Turnage said in a recent interview.
Turnage’s challenge is one of several examples of younger Democrats taking on older incumbents in House races across the country this year. But defeating incumbents, who have often built up war chests and enjoy high name recognition, remains challenging. The winner of Tuesday’s primary will be heavily favored in the November election in a district that Kamala Harris carried by 20 points in 2024.
Still, it’s not clear that Turnage has built up enough momentum since launching his campaign in December to oust the three-decade incumbent. He launched his first television ad last month, introducing himself to voters by saying that he was “done waiting for Washington politicians to fix what they’ve broken.”
But Thompson, 78, has led in fundraising, with Federal Election Commission filings showing he had $1.5 million on hand as of Feb. 18, compared with the $40,000 that Turnage had available for the final stretch of the campaign, according to pre-primary reports.
“Elections were created to give people the ability to make a choice,” Thompson said in a statement. “I am confident that my record on behalf of the people of Mississippi’s Second Congressional District will speak for itself.”
Moving on in Georgia
Also today, voters in Georgia’s 14th District will decide who will replace Marjorie Taylor Greene, the onetime MAGA stalwart who resigned from Congress in January after a dramatic split with President Donald Trump. The seat, heavily favored toward Republicans, is essential to the GOP’s razor-thin House majority in the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson has been battling absences and defections.
And many are looking to move on from Greene, our colleague Victor Feldman reported. “This is a messy divorce and people don’t want to take sides,” Carl Cavalli, a political science professor at the University of North Georgia, told him.
Seventeen candidates are competing to fill the remainder of Greene’s term, including a dozen Republicans. All of the contenders are competing on the same ballot, regardless of their party affiliation, and if none receives a majority of the vote, the top two finishers will advance to an April 7 runoff.
Trump-endorsed local prosecutor Clay Fuller, former state legislator Colton Moore and ex-Greene staffer Jim Tully are among the more prominent Republicans vying for the seat. And while vastly outnumbered in the deep-red district, several Democrats are in the race, including Army veteran Shawn Harris, who lost to Greene in 2024.
Photo finish
