GA-HD34: Special election for Stone Mountain House seat heads to runoff [View all]

Just seven weeks after Rep. Karen Bennett (D-Stone Mountain) pled guilty to fraudulently obtaining pandemic unemployment payments, voters in House District 94 headed to the polls Tuesday for a special election for her replacement through Dec. 31, when Bennett’s term ends.

The first competitive election in more than a decade for the Stone Mountain seat, which straddles DeKalb and Gwinnett Counties, attracted four Democratic candidates. Of those, education consultant Venola Mason and former Snellville mayor Kelly Kautz will head to a runoff on April 7.

Mason, a former Atlanta Public Schools teacher, was the leading vote-getter, with 42% of the vote (1,199 votes) in the March 10 special election. Kautz, a lawyer, came in second with 23.2% of the vote (629 votes), according to unofficial results from the Georgia Secretary of State’s office.

Mason, 46, and Kautz, 48, fended off two Gen-Z contenders in their early 20s, Audrey Lux and Ikenna Ugwumadu. Lux finished third with 16.3% of the vote (442 votes), while Ugwumadu finished fourth with 16.3% (441 votes).


https://atlantaciviccircle.org/2026/03/11/special-election-stone-mountain-house-runoff-hd94/