A former college professor is touting her anti-abortion stance as she enters the Republican field for the crowded 7th District congressional race.
Lisa Noel Babbage, a former DeKalb County teacher and adjunct professor at Southeastern University, announced her candidacy on Friday, June 21, in a press release that highlighted her involvement in a birthday event for President Donald Trump at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.
Babbage said she is running as a “pro-God, pro-America, pro-life” candidate and has already been endorsed by the National Black Pro-Life Union.
The Duluth resident has been active in civic and political circles in Gwinnett County and Georgia. She has been a member of the executive board of the Gwinnett County Republican Party and the Georgia GOP state committee. She also founded Women in Action in 2018, an organization that connected small businesses in Georgia with federal legislative efforts “aimed at strengthening the economy of marginalized communities.”
Babbage also pledged to contribute “a significant portion” of her legislative salary back to “small businesses and community programs” in the district.
She joins a packed Republican field vying to try to maintain Republican control of District 7 after incumbent Rep. Rob Woodall won by just 419 votes in 2018, the most competitive U.S. House race in the country.
The razor-thin margin was a sign to Democrats that the traditionally-conservative district formed by the majority of Forsyth and Gwinnett counties is part of a recent demographic shift observed in other metro-Atlanta suburbs.
Woodall announced in February he won’t run again, and a group of Democratic candidates has emerged since, including Georgia State University professor Carolyn Bourdeaux, who lost to Woodall in 2018, along with state Rep. Brenda Lopez Romero (D-99), activist Nabilah Islam, attorney Marqus Cole and former Fulton County Commission chairman John Eaves.
Babbage adds to an even bigger crop of Republican candidates, including longtime state Sen. Renee Unterman (R-Buford), former Home Depot executive Lynne Homrich, former Atlanta Falcons player Joe Profit, Air Force veteran Ben Bullock, physician Rich McCormick, businessman Mark Gonsalves and former education executive Lerah Lee.