Dr. Anissa Jones Challenges Residency of Dr. James Beverly, House District 139 Race

Today, the race for House District 139 turned into a battle in an Atlanta Courtroom. Dr. Anissa Jones filed a complaint at the state capital challenging Dr. James Beverly’s residence in the district. Jones says she never wanted to use this challenge as a campaign tactic.

“My whole thing was to have an integral, amicable, honest race. You run your race, I’ll run mine, let the best person win.”

That’s what it was until about a week ago. Both candidates say they never intended for this race to turn into political theater.

“I got a letter, and I thought, huh, this is interesting, and I was pretty shocked, but one of the things that I actually realized was that this could actually turn into a gotcha moment, where people are like, I got this, I got that, and I thought well this is not the type of politics I am going to run,” says Beverly.

He’s referring to the complaint filed by Jones. It called for a hearing to determine whether or not Beverly really lives in District 139. An on-going separation has left Beverly with two homes, but he says he lives in the district on Chestnut Street.