Nikema Williams, state senator and chair of Georgia Democrats, named to replace John Lewis

Georgia Democrats on Monday chose its state party chairwoman, state Sen. Nikema Williams, to replace the late John Lewis on the congressional ballot this November.

Ms. Williams, who will turn 42 next week, is expected to cruise to victory in the Peach State’s 5th Congressional District, which is comprises most of Atlanta and is thus majority Black and leans heavily Democratic. The GOP candidate is Angela Stanton-King.

MR. Lewis, a civil rights icon, passed away Friday from cancer.

Ms. Williams came to the Georgia legislature through a special election in 2017 and has been a player in the state Democratic party for some time. Her husband was a longtime aide of MR. Lewis.

In November 2018, Ms. Williams gained notoriety when she was arrested in the Georgia capital during a demonstration over voting rights. She told Mother Jones magazine, however, that she never intended to join the demonstration and be arrested, and instead was collared when she simply joined some of her constituents who were watching the event.

Prior to politics, Ms. Williams was a vice president with Planned Parenthood Southeast, and she fashions herself a champion of women’s and family rights.

She was picked among five finalists, a group whittled down from 131 who applied for the position, according to the state party. The finalists all represented the younger, more aggressively liberal face of the Democratic Party, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. In addition to her duties as a state senator, Ms. Williams is also active with the Democratic National Committee where she serves on the Executive and Resolution committees.

Georgia law permits a party to replace a candidate on the ballot in the case of a candidate’s death, but Democrats said they had to do so by 4 p.m. EST Monday or risk losing the seat.

The fast move bothered some party members who believed Democrats should instead name an established, placeholder candidate, a process that would then allow a wide-open field of candidates to run in 2022.

Among those favoring such a route were Mr. Lewis’ former top aide Michael Collins, who felt an arrangement that smacked of insider politics was anathema to the spirit of Mr. Lewis, whose passing marked the last of all the African-Americans who addressed the crowd at the famous March on Washington in 1963.

“He believed very strongly that the people who represent the citizens should be elected by the citizens,” Mr. Collins wrote after Mr. Lewis’ passing. “And that a free and fair election, where all individuals have a level-playing field, is in the best interest of our democracy.”

A handful of high profile Georgia Democrats who were expected to put in their nomination did not, including Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms and Stacey Abrams, who was defeated in her 2018 gubernatorial bid. It was a protest over Ms. Abrams’ loss at which Ms. Williams found herself arrested.