Republican Chet Hand will be the next Boone County judge/executive after securing a decisive electoral victory.
Hand, a current Boone County commissioner, defeated libertarian-leaning independent Timothy Dean Johnson and write-in candidate William Woods in Tuesday’s general election. No Democrat ran in the race.
According to the Kentucky Secretary of State’s election night tracker, Hand received 24,962 votes, accounting for 63% of the total. Johnson received 14,000 votes, while fewer than 500 write-in votes were cast.
Hand will serve a four-year term as Boone County judge/executive beginning in January 2027. As judge/executive, he will oversee the county’s executive operations and preside over the Boone County Fiscal Court, which is responsible for adopting the county budget, approving expenditures and overseeing county services and infrastructure. His term will run through December 2030.
Hand launched his judge/executive campaign in April 2025, more than a year before the Republican primary. With no Democrats running for the judge/executive seat, the Republican primary became a high-stakes election, pitting Hand against longtime Boone County Judge/Executive Gary Moore, who was first elected in 1998.
The primary proved contentious, as Hand ran as the anti-status quo candidate, arguing that Boone County needed a more deliberate approach to continued residential and commercial development. Moore, the incumbent judge/executive, defended his administration’s record, emphasizing the county’s economic growth, fiscal stability and development during his nearly three decades in office.
Hand was elected to the Boone County Fiscal Court in 2022 after defeating incumbent Commissioner Charles Kenner in the Republican Primary, before running unopposed in the general election. Hand previously served as the chairman of the Boone County Republican Party.
