Republican Rich McCormick, who in 2020 lost Georgia’s Seventh Congressional District race to Representative Carolyn Bourdeaux (D-GA-07), announced Tuesday he’s running again — but this time for the state’s Sixth Congressional District.
McCormick told The Georgia Star News that the newly redrawn Seventh District is now a 65 percent Democrat stronghold. He said any Republican would have a difficult time competing there.
“There is nobody that has a claim to the Sixth [District] any more than I do,” McCormick said.
“I am the only one who has ever run for Congress that is running in that race right now, and a lot of people who will be voting in that race have already voted for me once.”
Republican Jake Evans announced his candidacy for the Sixth District earlier this year.
Evans, when asked, downplayed his new competition.
“The only Congressional candidate in the nation to lose a Republican incumbent seat in 2020 just flipped into the CD6 race,” Evans told The Star News via text.
“I guess he also concluded he couldn’t win the district he ran for last time (CD7) or the district that he lives in (CD9). He won’t be winning his opportunistic play for CD6 either.”
With the newly redrawn lines McCormick said, yes, he lives inside the Ninth Congressional District — by only about 1,000 feet in. Representative Andrew Clyde (R-GA-09) currently represents that district.
“He [Clyde] is one of the congressmen who endorsed me. I would not run against someone who is a friend who has endorsed me. I discussed it with Andrew Clyde to make sure he wasn’t running in the 10th, which he has been drawn into. As you know, Lucy McBath is not running in the Sixth. She is running in the Seventh. Carolyn Bourdeaux lives in the Ninth and is running in the Seventh. There are people all over the place right now.”
Clyde announced last week that he plans to run for re-election in Georgia’s Ninth Congressional District.
U.S. Representative Lucy McBath (D-GA-06) announced last week that she will run in a different district, as established by Georgia’s redistricting process, thus abandoning her current district.
According to Ballotpedia, McCormick graduated from Morehouse School of Medicine and did an emergency medicine residency through Emory University. He earned an MBA at National University and served in the U.S. Marine Corps.
Georgia Public Broadcasting (GPB) reported that the new boundaries will likely help elect nine Republicans and five Democrats. Georgia voters elected eight Republicans and six Democrats in 2020.
Republican and former state legislator Meagan Hanson announced her candidacy for the Sixth District in July.
Hanson did not return The Star News’ request for comment before Tuesday’s stated deadline.
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Chris Butler is an investigative journalist at The Tennessee Star. Follow Chris on Facebook. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Rich McCormick” by Dr. Rich McCormick for Congress.
