For more than a year, Michael Thurmond traveled across the state giving dozens of talks to groups of Georgians with barely a mention of his plan to run for governor in the 2026 election. He talked instead about the book he’d written about the life of James Oglethorpe, the British nobleman who’d founded Georgia as an abolitionist colony even though he’d once been an officer in England’s Royal African Slave Company.

And so, some of the people in Thurmond’s audiences might have been surprised to see the news that Thurmond has officially announced his candidacy for the Democratic nomination for governor. He joins a field of candidates already in full campaign mode, including former Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms , state Senator Jason Esteves , and state Representative Derrick Jacks

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