A plain-language guide to the responsibilities of every state-level position on Georgia's 2026 ballot — and how each one touches your daily life.
All eight executive offices are elected statewide to four-year terms. Only the governor is term-limited (two terms). Each runs a state agency with real, day-to-day power over Georgians' lives.
Georgia's chief executive and the most powerful office in state government.
Unlike most states, Georgia's governor cannot issue pardons — that power belongs to the appointed Board of Pardons and Paroles.
2026: Keisha Lance Bottoms (D) vs. Rick Jackson (R)Elected separately from the governor — the two can be from different parties.
The real power here is legislative: a lieutenant governor can advance or bury bills in the Senate.
2026: Josh McLaurin (D) vs. Greg Dolezal (R)The state's chief lawyer and top law-enforcement legal officer.
Decides whether Georgia joins — or fights — major national lawsuits on healthcare, immigration, elections, and more.
2026: Tanya Miller (D) vs. Brian Strickland (R)Georgia's chief elections official — and much more.
This office decides how easy or hard it is to register, vote, and have your ballot counted.
2026: Penny Brown Reynolds (D) vs. Tim Fleming (R)Regulates one of the biggest costs in most household budgets.
Runs the Georgia Department of Labor.
When layoffs hit, this is the office Georgians deal with directly to get benefits.
2026: Nikki Porcher (D) vs. Bárbara Rivera Holmes (R, incumbent)Leads the Department of Agriculture — which touches every grocery store and gas station.
Runs the Georgia Department of Education for 1.7 million K-12 public school students.
Local school boards run schools day to day, but this office sets the statewide framework they operate in.
2026: Lydia Powell (D) vs. Richard Woods (R, incumbent)Five commissioners serve staggered six-year terms. Each must live in a numbered district, but every Georgia voter votes in every PSC race — they're elected statewide.
The commission that decides what you pay for power and gas.
Few offices affect your monthly bills more directly — a single rate case can move the average household bill by hundreds of dollars a year.
2026: District 3 — Peter Hubbard (D, incumbent) vs. Fitz Johnson (R) · District 5 — Shelia Edwards (D) vs. Josh Tolbert (R)Unlike the statewide offices above, legislators are elected only by voters in their district. Every seat in both chambers is on the ballot every two years.
One of 56 members of Georgia's upper chamber.
One of 180 members of the Georgia House — the chamber closest to voters, with about 60,000 residents per district.