Five candidates are running for two seats on the Georgia Public Service Commission in the general election on November 3, 2026. Incumbent Peter Hubbard (D) and Fitz Johnson (R) are running in District 3. Shelia Edwards (D), Josh Tolbert (R), and Thomas Blooming (L) are running in District 5. District 5 incumbent Tricia Pridemore (R) ran for the U.S. House rather than seeking re-election.
The Georgia Recorder's Alander Rocha said the election "is becoming a test on whether pocketbook issues and concerns about unchecked data center growth can overcome traditional party lines ... after the commission signed off on a series of Georgia Power rate increases in recent years." Rocha said, "Republicans running for the seat this year are facing ideological differences over how to approach utility regulation, and looking at the May primary results, it appears Republican voters are also divided."
Hubbard defeated then-incumbent Johnson in a special election in 2025. He is a former energy analyst who ran unsuccessfully for the Georgia House of Representatives in 2022. His campaign website says he had "[p]ublished a data center cost analysis estimating that data center electricity discounts shift over a billion dollars in infrastructure costs onto residential customers."
Johnson is a U.S. Army veteran and businessman. Gov. Brian Kemp (R) appointed him to the board in 2021, where he served until 2025. In a post on X.com, Johnson said, "Data centers should pay their fair share of the power bill, and because of the protections I put in place during my time as Public Service Commissioner in Georgia, they will."
Edwards is a business owner who ran unsuccessfully for the Georgia House of Representatives in 2016 and 2018. She was the Democratic nominee to run against Johnson in 2022 before that election was canceled. Her campaign website says, "As massive data centers and AI facilities place increasing demands on our electric grid, they must pay the full cost of the infrastructure needed to serve them—not shift those costs onto residential customers and small businesses."
Tolbert is an engineer and business owner who ran unsuccessfully for the Georgia Senate in 2025. His campaign website says, "While data centers should pay their incremental costs, that alone does not protect ratepayers ... I am pro-growth, pro-business, and pro-data center. But I am equally committed to protecting Georgia’s ratepayers."
The commission has a 3-2 Republican majority. If both Hubbard and Edwards win, Democrats will win a 3-2 majority on the commission. If either Johnson or Tolbert wins, Republicans will maintain their majority.
The Georgia Public Service Commission is a five-member board responsible for regulating Georgia's public utilities. Although members represent districts, they are elected statewide to six-year terms. Scheduled elections in 2022 and 2024 were canceled because of a then-ongoing lawsuit challenging the statewide election of commissioners.
If no candidate wins a majority of the vote in the District 5 election, the top two finishers will advance to a December 1 runoff.
