Elections for the Georgia Public Service Commission are headed to a runoff and possibly a rematch.
In District 3, Democrat Peter Hubbard, the incumbent, ran unopposed in the primary. In November, he may end up facing Republican former Commissioner Fitz Johnson, who he unseated in an election last year.
Johnson’s race, against Republican Brandon Martin, is a close one. The AP had yet to call a winner as of Friday morning, though Johnson had a slight edge over Martin.
In District 5, two of the Republicans are advancing to a runoff since no one cracked 50% of the votes in the three-candidate race. Republicans Bobby Mehan and Josh Tolbert will square off again in Georgia’s primary runoff election on June 16.
In the District 5 Democratic primary, Shelia Edwards defeated opponents Craig Cupid and Angelia Pressley. She will face the winner of the runoff between Mehan and Tolbert, as well as Libertarian Thomas Blooming in the November general election.
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What is the PSC?
Georgia is one of only 10 states that elects its utility commission. The board has final say over how much millions of Georgians pay for electricity. The state’s Public Service Commission, or PSC, also has substantial say over how that electricity is made and, because fossil fuel power plants are a leading producer of greenhouse gases, the PSC’s decisions directly influence Georgia’s contribution to climate change.
From 2006 until last year, all five members of the PSC were Republicans. Democrats Peter Hubbard and Alicia Johnson won upset victories in 2025, meaning the elections this November will be the Democrats’ first chance in decades to win a majority presence on the commission.
“I’m running to be that third vote that’s going to help them change the trajectory of the PSC,” Edwards said in an interview before this week’s primary. “And to bring some balance to something that’s been completely imbalanced for years.”
The 2025 elections have had ripple effects in other utility commission races around the country, too. In Arizona, national activist groups on both sides of the aisle have gotten involved in the race. Alabama lawmakers overhauled their commission in an attempt to shield it from the chance that voters will oust its Republicans.
Almost all the candidates — from both parties — have said if elected, they would support more renewable energy in Georgia and provide more scrutiny of Georgia Power’s ongoing expansion plans.
While the Democrats have emphasized renewables, Republican candidates Mehan and Tolbert have clarified they don’t support any sort of renewable energy mandate.
“I do not think there is a place on the commission for advocates,” Tolbert said ahead of the primary. “It’s not a legislative body. It doesn’t set particular policies. Its job is to ensure that Georgians have reliable, affordable electricity.”
The District 5 Republican runoff
Tolbert’s main pitch to voters has been his technical expertise as an engineer with experience working in multiple types of power plants.
Mehan has said his business experience means he can find innovative solutions to problems. He described himself as a pro-gas, pro-nuclear, “all the above energy guy.”
The possible District 3 rematch
Control of the commission will also come down to the potential rematch between Peter Hubbard and Fitz Johnson. Last year’s election in District Three, which Hubbard won, was only for a one-year term. The winner of the general election in November will serve a full, six-year term.
As of Wednesday evening, Johnson was narrowly ahead of his primary opponent Brandon Martin. The result could fall within the margin for a recount.
Unlike most candidates from both parties in the primary, Johnson has said the commission has done enough to protect ordinary ratepayers from the costs of serving data centers — a hot-button issue as more of the energy-hungry facilities flock to the state and Georgia Power spends billions of dollars on new resources to serve them.
Recent decisions by the PSC
The commission’s votes on that utility expansion help drive home the repercussions of this election — for people’s personal finances and for the climate.
In December, after the two Democrats’ election victory but before the new commissioners took their seats, the five Republican commissioners voted unanimously to approve a huge expansion for Georgia Power; the proposal added 10 gigawatts of energy, most of it made with natural gas.
Early this year, environmental and consumer advocates pushed the commission to reconsider some of the new energy, arguing that the plan would generate more electricity than the utility’s own forecast calls for. The commission, they argued, overstepped its legal authority. The new Democratic commissioners voted to reopen the issue, but the effort failed — with all three Republicans voting against it.
Earlier last year the all-Republican commission approved a deal to largely freeze customers’ rates, following a few years of Georgia Power bill increases. The commissioners also approved the utility’s long-term power plan that allows coal plants to stay open longer, includes improvements to the power grid, and launches a new pilot program for rooftop solar with battery storage.
More recently, the PSC has been presented with a plan from Georgia Power that would lower bills — though not to the level they were before the multiple increases. That deal is currently under consideration by the commission, which will vote on it later this month.
