Young Democrat Mateo Sanabria Targets Republican-Held Forsyth County House Seat

Mateo Sanabria, a 23-year-old Democrat and Forsyth Central High School graduate, is targeting Republican incumbent Brent Cox in Georgia House District 28, a seat Cox won by 55 percentage points just sixteen months ago. The math is steep: Cox drew 26,500 votes against Democrat Michael Henson's 7,350 in November 2024, a 76-to-21 margin out of 34,724 total ballots cast. For Sanabria to reach a majority in November 2026, he would need roughly 17,363 votes, more than double what any Democrat has managed in this district in the current cycle.

The district covers northeast Forsyth County and western Hall County, running through the Chestatee, Coal Mountain, and north Cumming corridors. Its rapid residential development is the core of Sanabria's argument: he says rising housing costs are squeezing the same families who moved to northeast Forsyth for affordability, and that incumbent representation has done nothing to confront it. "These companies are absolutely gouging people," he said at a town hall last year. He has pledged to reject corporate money, a pledge he frames as central to credibility on the issue.

Born in Atlanta and the son of two Colombian immigrant business owners, Sanabria returned to Forsyth County after earning his bachelor's degree from Georgia State University in 2023. He has worked as a programmer and affiliates with Young Democrats of Georgia, Forsyth County Democrats, and Hall County Democrats, the last affiliation reflecting that roughly a quarter of District 28 sits in Hall County. "I am a 23-year-old candidate wanting to make sure Georgia is an affordable place to live for the current and future generations," he told Ballotpedia in a candidate survey completed in 2025.

In March 2026, Sanabria co-hosted a listening session in Gainesville alongside District 29 candidate Scott Soracco, presenting both races as part of a coordinated Democratic push into northeast Georgia's outer suburbs.

His primary is uncontested. Ballotpedia lists no other Democrat in the May 19, 2026, primary field, which means Sanabria goes directly to face Cox in the November 3 general election. The question is not whether he gets on the ballot but whether northeast Forsyth County's growth has created a constituency that was simply absent in 2024, and whether a 136 percent increase in the Democratic vote total is achievable in a midterm environment with a Republican president in the White House.

Cox has not publicly responded to Sanabria's candidacy in available reporting. His 2024 margin left little sign he considered the seat in danger, winning by more than 19,000 votes in a district that has trended Republican through successive rounds of Forsyth County's population surge.