Deborah González made history on December first when she prevailed in the election for Georgia District Attorney in a run-off against James Chafin by a vote of 53.1% to 46.9%.
Gonzalez’s win creates several milestones.
- Gonzalez will be the first Puerto Rican woman to be elected district attorney in the United States.
- She will be the first Latina to serve as a district attorney in Georgia.
- She will be the first woman to be district attorney for Georgia’s Western Judicial Circuit.
She won the seat after emerging victorious in a federal voting rights lawsuit that was ultimately decided by Georgia’s Supreme Court.
Soon after Gonzalez’s win was made official, she participated in the Georgia Electoral College vote. As first reported in The Nation, when it came time for González to cast her vote for Vice President–elect Kamala Harris, “It was so moving, I had to fight back tears,” she said. “I was so honored to vote for the first woman vice president.”
Gonzalez ran on a platform that included reforming the criminal justice system and ending discrimination. She also stood for the end to cash bail for nonviolent defendants, the death penalty, and prosecution of women under HB481, an anti-abortion law. She favors a $15 minimum wage and a Medicare-for-all plan.
Bio
Gonzalez is a practicing attorney, working primarily with media and entertainment cases.
She served District 117 in the Georgia House of Representatives. She served on several committees during her stint: judiciary non-civil, code revision, and intergovernmental coordination. She also served as Vice Chair of a national task force on Law & Criminal Justice for the National Hispanic Caucus of State Legislators.
Gonzalez is the author of Managing Online Risk, a book that makes digital dish management understandable to people who are not experts in IT or the law. The book explains how to identify potential online security risks, determine the level of risk they represent, and head those risks off at the pass.
She is also the host of “Open Records with Deborah Gonzalez.” a podcast that explores current issues. Topics range from how to stay safe during the holidays to food insecurity. A recent episode discussed holiday traditions in her community, showing “another side of the diversity that we have here in Athens and Oconee.”
