Daughter of late House Dem loses runoff bid to finish father’s term

Marcye Scott, the daughter of late Rep. David Scott, D-Ga., fell short Tuesday in her bid to succeed her father in Congress for the final few months of his term, despite leading the first-round of voting last month.

Former teacher and Gwinnett County school board chairman Everton Blair defeated Scott in the special election runoff for the remainder of David Scott’s term in Georgia’s heavily Democratic 13th Congressional District, which covers parts of metro Atlanta. Blair will hold the seat only through early January, when the winner of November’s regularly scheduled general election takes office.

Blair also ran in the primary to compete for a full-term, but lost to Democratic Georgia state representative Jasmine Clark in the primary earlier this year. Clark will battle Republican Jonathan Chavez in November for the seat, the official term for which will start in January 2027.

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David Scott represented the district for more than two decades before dying April 22 at age 80. At the time of his death, he was seeking a 13th term and facing a competitive Democratic primary challenge from Clark and others.

In 2024, he carried the district with roughly 72% of the vote, while then-Vice President Kamala Harris won about 71% there in the presidential race, compared with roughly 28% for President Donald Trump.

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Marcye Scott entered Tuesday’s runoff after leading the July 28 special election with roughly 46% of the vote, compared with about 38% for Blair, but fell short of the majority required to win outright, leading to the runoff against Blair.

Blair’s victory would restore voting representation to Georgia’s heavily Democratic 13th District and add another Democratic vote to the narrowly divided House for the final months of the 119th Congress. Georgia’s 13th District has been without voting representation since David Scott’s death, although his former congressional offices have remained open under the supervision of the House clerk to provide constituent services, according to the Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives.

According to his campaign’s website, Blair earned graduate degrees from Stanford and Harvard, previously worked with the Obama administration’s White House Initiative on Educational Excellence and, in 2018, was the first Black and youngest-ever member elected to his county’s school board.