A district in Georgia that covers parts of Milton, Roswell, and Alpharetta hasn’t had a significant Democrat challenger in more than 20 years, but the entry of a social media-savvy candidate who has attracted floods of out-of-state funding has suddenly made the race peculiar and one to watch.
Georgia House District 47 is currently led by state Rep. Jan Jones, a Republican member of the Georgia House of Representatives who has served as speaker pro tempore since 2010. She has held the district seat since 2013 but announced in February she would not seek reelection.
The Democrat candidate seeking to replace her, Lindsay DeFranco, is garnering lots of attention, and out-of-state funds, in what would otherwise be a sleepy district and a shoo-in for any Republican candidate.
DeFranco, who moved to Georgia with her husband in 2024, has a large social media following. She boasts 187,000 followers on Instagram, about 14,000 followers on her campaign Instagram account, and nearly 7,000 subscribers on her Lindsay DeFranco for Georgia YouTube channel.
She told the Daily Signal that her campaign is built around “a pretty simple idea [of] lower costs and higher standards.” The Democrat said she thinks she can win because “the issues we’re talking about aren’t exclusively Democratic or Republican issues.”
Battling DeFranco is Jack Miller, a Republican and financial planner who graduated from Milton High School. He told the Daily Signal that he was inspired to run for the seat because “commitment to community goes hand in hand with work as a financial planner.” Miller said he “helps families and small businesses prepare for the future and make the most of what they earn after the government takes its cut.”
DeFranco won an uncontested primary race in May, while Miller defeated fellow Republican Brian Cochran by a 26-point margin in the June primary. The winner of the Nov. 3 General Election stands to represent 59,400 local Georgia residents in the district.
But what makes the race interesting is DeFranco’s campaign funding.
According to the Georgia State Ethics Commission website, her campaign has received $166,530, including $53,259 in out-of-state contributions and $28,065 for in-state contributions. Another $85,205—nearly half of her total campaign cash—is from unitemized, anonymous donors.
More than 900 of her identified donors live outside of the state, including every state except Wyoming. She also has donors from the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Filings also show that 65.5% of her itemized contributions came from out-of-state donors.
District residents gave DeFranco a total of $1,125. Donors from California gave roughly nine times as much as district donors gave, while donors from other states such as Washington and New York gave roughly three times the donations that district donors gave.
By contrast, Jack Miller’s campaign has raised $124,622, with $120,720 coming from inside Georgia and just $6,999 coming from out of state. He has received just $1,948 in unitemized, anonymous donations.
DeFranco has stated that she “didn’t get here by relying on corporate PACs or special interests.” However, Miller claims she is “busy with answering to her out-of-state donors and their divisive politics.”
When asked why she has received so much out-of-state money, DeFranco didn’t return the Daily Signal’s request for comment.
She did say why she’s running. DeFranco said she has spent time and energy at the state Capitol “attending legislative hearings, testifying on bills, and paying attention to decisions that most people never even hear about until they’re already affecting their lives.”
Notably, she testified against Senate Bill 74, legislation that “revise
After DeFranco testified against the bill, state Rep. Charlice Byrd asked her about her view on having sexually explicit books such as “Looking for Alaska,” a 2005 young adult fiction story by American author John Green, in libraries. Byrd said such books should be moved into the adult section.
DeFranco replied, “If you do want my feedback, I feel like students are exposed to that kind of talk and that kind of content every day anyway.”
She added that while she doesn’t think that type of content should be in an elementary school, she supports the author. “I’m actually friends with the author of that book. I support him a lot,” she said.
DeFranco also said she wanted to make sure librarians weren’t “criminalized” for explicit materials and that parents should be trusted to know what’s best for their kids.
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[ H/T The Daily Signal ]
