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Our verdict

LiberalMind endorses Fitz Johnson

Election Day is November 3, and every Georgia voter votes in this race — Public Service Commissioners are elected statewide by residency district. In the November 4, 2025 special election, Peter Hubbard, a Democrat, unseated Fitz Johnson, the Republican commissioner appointed in 2021, with roughly 63% of the vote. A year later they meet again, with control of the five-member commission — currently 3–2 Republican after Democrats flipped two seats in 2025 — in the balance, and with Georgia Power bills up about $43 a month across 2023–2025 on PSC-approved increases in the background. Johnson holds his former seat's challenger position this time, and more than two-thirds of his larger contributions, per a labeled advocacy analysis, come from people and entities tied to companies the commission regulates; Hubbard's comparable share is 2.7%. LiberalMind endorses Fitz Johnson. Read the research, and see why — this is the hardest call in Georgia's statewide file, and we flag it as borderline ourselves.

How Georgia got here

The PSC is a five-member body regulating Georgia Power (electricity), natural gas and telecom, and setting utility rates. Commissioners serve six-year terms, reside in districts, and are elected statewide (Ballotpedia News; Generation180 explainer).

The 2025 special, certified shape: Hubbard unseated Johnson in the November 4, 2025 special election with roughly 63% — a roughly 26-point margin — and took office in January 2026 (Reuters; Powering Georgia; Ballotpedia News). Republicans currently hold a 3–2 majority after Democrats flipped two seats in those 2025 specials; if Hubbard holds District 3 and the Democrat wins District 5, Democrats take a 3–2 majority (Ballotpedia News).

The rate context, documented: PSC-approved Georgia Power hikes added about $43 a month on average to residential bills across 2023–2025, including Vogtle nuclear costs and fuel charges (Energy Central summary); a PSC survey put summer bills for 1,000-kWh customers up 41% since 2021 to nearly $190 a month (Reuters). The commission has since approved freezing base rates through 2028, and in December 2025 certified roughly 9,885 MW (about 10 GW) of new, mostly gas, capacity driven by data-center demand — a decision Hubbard opposed that now sits effectively in the rate base (Energy Central; the docket claims as labeled in the analysis sourcing). Johnson served on the commission through December 2025; the 2023–2025 increases were approved on a commission he sat on. That overlap is arithmetic from the sourced dates, and we print it as exactly that.

Primaries, May 2026: Hubbard won his primary; Johnson won the Republican primary narrowly — "eked out a Primary victory" (Fiveash-Stanley recap).

Two candidates, confirmed by USA Today's Georgia guide, the Savannah Morning News voter guide, and The Current's coastal guide: Peter Hubbard (D), the incumbent, and Fitz Johnson (R), the former commissioner.

Competitiveness: coverage reports "limited public polling on both PSC races" (Powering Georgia); no horse-race poll of this race was located, and coverage frames the expected outcome as tracking the top of the ticket. We print that, and no invented number.

Money — donor composition only, from a labeled advocacy source: The Energy and Policy Institute's analysis of campaign-finance filings, updated August 20, 2026 — an advocacy research shop, labeled as such — found more than two-thirds of Johnson's contributions of $500 or more came from people/entities tied to companies the PSC regulates, while Hubbard's comparable share was 2.7% (Energy and Policy Institute). No raised or cash-on-hand totals were sourced for either campaign, and none are printed.

Fitz Johnson (Republican) — the former commissioner, running to return

Background and service: A U.S. Army veteran and businessman; appointed commissioner by Gov. Kemp in 2021 and served until December 2025 (Ballotpedia News). Proven in this exact office — and voted out of it, by roughly 26 points, a year ago.

The record, claim by claim: He says data centers "should pay their fair share" and credits protections he put in place as commissioner (Ballotpedia News). The commission he served on approved the increases summarized above across 2023–2025; the sourced record does not break out his individual votes on each increase in this research, and we do not assign them to him personally beyond his membership on the commission that approved them.

The residency challenge — both halves, as our standard requires: Johnson faced an eligibility complaint alleging his legal residence is a $1.3 million Cobb County home outside District 3; a judge ruled he meets the legal residency requirement (The Current PSC coverage; Powering Georgia). The challenge was made and rejected. Both halves are the fact; neither half alone is.

Pros: Four-plus years serving on this commission — the regulatory record, the dockets, and the utilities are known quantities to him, and his data-center position is the same sentence consumer advocates use: they should pay their fair share, under protections he says he put in place. He is the in-tent Republican in a race whose winner helps decide whether the commission majority flips.

Cons: The electorate already graded his commission tenure once, in 2025, and removed him by roughly 26 points — the single loudest electoral fact in this file, priced in our call below, not hidden from it. His primary win this year was narrow. And the donor-composition finding, from a labeled advocacy source, is heavy: more than two-thirds of his $500-plus money tied to the regulated, against his opponent's 2.7%. For a regulator, who funds the campaign is not gossip; it is the job's central temptation, documented here at advocacy-analysis strength.

The flaw, plainly: A documented funding-composition exposure on the precise conflict this office exists to police, plus a proven electoral rejection of the commission he served on — personal-record species on the money, electorate's-verdict species on the service. Neither is a proven act of regulatory favoritism in office, and none is sourced here.

Peter Hubbard (Democratic) — the incumbent, by a landslide, for a year

Background and service: A former energy analyst / clean-energy consultant; he ran unsuccessfully for the Georgia House in 2022. He won this seat in the November 2025 special and took office in January 2026 — brief service in this office, proven electoral service (Ballotpedia News; Reuters). His campaign cites a published data-center cost analysis estimating data-center electricity discounts shift over $1 billion in infrastructure costs onto residential customers (Ballotpedia News). On the commission, his motions on data-center cost allocation lost 3–2 repeatedly, per a long-form analysis source (LinkedIn analysis — opinion/analysis sourcing, labeled); he opposed the December 2025 certification of roughly 10 GW of new capacity (Energy Central summary, as labeled in the rate context above).

The Manchin-test fact, stated plainly: No proven break, in service, with his party on our values was located in this research. His commission record as sourced — opposing the capacity certification, pressing data-center cost allocation from the minority — is his party's standard regulatory position, prosecuted from a 3–2 minority. That is effective minority service; it is not a break with his party, and the test requires a break.

Pros: He is the incumbent because Georgia voters chose him by roughly 26 points a year ago, in a special election held in the middle of the bill increases — the closest thing this file has to a direct popular verdict on PSC policy. His technical background (energy analyst, clean-energy consultant) is the race's deepest subject-matter résumé, his cited cost analysis puts a number — over $1 billion — on the data-center cost shift, and his donor-composition share from regulated-tied sources is 2.7% under the same labeled analysis that burdens his opponent.

Cons: His service is brief — since January 2026 — and, in a 3–2 minority, winless on the motions sourced here. A hold by Hubbard, combined with a Democratic win in District 5, flips the commission to a Democratic majority whose regulatory program is the opposing party's; his voters may want exactly that, and our doctrine prices control of a regulatory body as a real consequence, not a footnote.

The flaw, plainly: No proven personal-conduct flaw was sourced. The doctrinal flaw, for our call, is the unmet exception test: a strong, popular, technically credible incumbent whose record contains no break with his party is still, under the test as written, a party-line Democrat — an enabler classification, stated as a classification and never as the extremist word, for which no evidence was located.

The minor candidates, briefly

None in District 3. (The Libertarian in this cycle's PSC voting, Thomas Blooming, runs only in District 5 and is covered in that race's article.) A standing check found no pedophile-association material meeting the proven standard — knowing association with or defense of a convicted pedophile — for any candidate on this ballot; an unproven accusation would never disqualify under that standard, and none is printed here.

OUR CALL

LiberalMind endorses Fitz Johnson.

We flag this as the most contestable call in Georgia's statewide file, in the article itself, because the facts that cut against it are the strongest facts in the race: Georgia voters removed Johnson from this seat a year ago by roughly 26 points; the commission he sat on approved the increases that added about $43 a month to residential bills across 2023–2025; and the labeled donor-composition analysis puts more than two-thirds of his larger contributions with regulated-tied sources. A doctrine that hid any of that would not be worth printing. The call still goes to Johnson, for stated reasons. No proven act of favoritism in office was sourced — the money finding is composition, at advocacy-analysis strength, about campaign funding, and it is answered on his own stated position that data centers should pay their fair share under protections he credits himself with putting in place. Hubbard, for all his strengths — and his 2025 mandate is the strongest electoral credential any Georgia statewide challenger or incumbent carries this cycle — meets no part of the Manchin test: no in-service break with his party was located, and his win combined with District 5 would hand the commission to that party's regulatory program. The Extremist Rule does not apply; no extremist was sourced on either side. What remains is the ordinary rule, applied at full strength and with its cost stated: endorse the in-tent Republican, with his rejection, his commission's rate record, and his donor composition printed above in full — and let readers who price the 2025 verdict above the doctrine see exactly what we priced, and how.

For the complete Election 2026 breakdown — every race, claim by claim — see the full coverage on our website.

Vote early. Research your candidates. Choose the best moderates, whatever their party — no extremism from either side. And encourage your friends and family to do the same.

Sources

Election result — November 5, 2026

Winner: Peter Hubbard (Democratic) — called by the Associated Press. This result was appended on November 5, 2026 (results wave 3); the original article above is unchanged, exactly as published before Election Day.

AI-assisted article — but the sources are human, and the facts are very real.

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