Tennessee Rep. Gloria Johnson won the state’s much-anticipated Democratic Senate primary and will face off against incumbent Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn in the November election.
Johnson is 74% As of Thursday night, when the Associated Press published the results of the race, the three had won by a majority of the votes, beating out their opponents Marquita Bradshaw, Sybil Miller Watkins and Laura Brown.
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Johnson drew widespread attention from Democrats across the country last year after he staged a protest in the Republican-controlled state Capitol following the Tennessee elementary school shooting.
Johnson’s protest was joined by two other Democratic state representatives, Justin Pearson and Justin Jones, who became known as the “Tennessee Three.” Pearson and Jones were expelled from the House after the protest for violating House rules, but were later reinstated.
Johnson’s most formidable challenger in the primary was Bradshaw, an environmental activist who won the party’s nomination in 2020 but lost in a landslide victory to incumbent Republican Sen. Bill Hagerty.
Democratic state Rep. Gloria Johnson of Knoxville speaks after voting to expel Nashville’s Justin Jones from the governing body, April 6, 2023, in Nashville, Tennessee.
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Johnson will face an uphill battle in a heavily Republican state where Blackburn won by 11 points in 2018 and Hagerty beat Bradshaw by 30 points in 2020. Two years later, Republican incumbent Gov. Bill Lee also won reelection by more than 30 points, and former President Donald Trump won the state by 26 and 23 points in 2016 and 2020, respectively.
Blackburn is leading the primary against the only other Republican incumbent, former Tennessee congressional staffer Tres Whittam.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) speaks onstage on the first day of the Republican National Convention at Fiserv Forum on July 15, 2024 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
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Blackburn also has a big fundraising advantage over all of the state’s Senate candidates, with about $9 million on hand, while Johnson has raised about $5 million and still has more than $2 million on hand.
But Johnson expressed optimism that he can defeat Blackburn, arguing Democrats can win by focusing on issues such as abortion, gun control and the environment.
