In keeping with, well, the past four years, Trump is making false claims that votes were “found” in Georgia. Gabriel Sterling, a Republican and the voting system implementation manager for the Georgia secretary of state, just shot down these lies.
Most media outlets (including ABC News) still haven’t projected a winner in the Ossoff-Perdue race, but Ossoff currently leads by 17,025 votes, or 0.38 percentage points. Notably, that is a wider margin than Biden’s win in Georgia in November. And with many votes from heavily Democratic areas still to be counted, there’s a good chance that Ossoff’s final margin will be wider than 0.5 points — which would mean that Perdue can’t request a recount.
This is a tweet worth chewing over from CNN’s Jake Tapper. We don’t usually put a lot of stock in anonymous reports of private polling, but it’s worth noting that our polling average also showed a small but noticeable shift toward Democrats starting on Dec. 30, the day Hawley announced he would object to the election results. Of course, correlation is not causation; this shift could have been due to any number of other issues, such as stimulus checks, or it might have even just been noise.
I have no doubt the McConnell/Paul Ryan Republican types who are the sources for lots of reporters (myself included) are blaming this loss on Trump. And I think that yes, the email inbox of a reporter who works at Politico probably does include many Republicans blaming Trump. But right now, we haven’t seen many really influential Republicans even acknowledge that Warnock won or that Ossoff is likely to win. Once those races are both called, I think yes, some Republican aides will anonymously blame Trump.
But how many Republicans will publicly turn on Trump and blame him for the Georgia results? I doubt many So overall, let’s say 7, pretty overblown, at least right now.
Considering most of the Republicans quoted in that article aren’t named, I’d give this like a 9, at least for now. If Republicans who are currently in office start shooting arrows at Trump, then maybe that headline will be more accurate.
Here’s the giant headline blared across the top of Politico right now: “Republicans turn on Trump after Georgia loss.” Do people think that’s overblown — let’s say on a scale from 1 (no, the headline is totally accurate) to 10 (it’s totally overblown)? Have we seen much tangible evidence/actions of Republicans turning on Trump?
Do The GOP’s Likely Defeats In Georgia Weaken Trump’s Efforts To Contest the Election Results?
The big news of Tuesday was the likely election of two Democratic senators in Georgia. The big news to come on Wednesday: President Trump and his allies’ plans to contest the presidential election. Will one affect the other, given the Georgia elections seem to reflect some dissatisfaction with the president?
More than 30,000 Trump supporters are expected to be in Washington, D.C. today protesting the presidential election results, according to The Washington Post. The president himself is expected to give a speech to them at an event near the White House around 11 a.m. Eastern time.
But I have to wonder if perhaps a few Republican members of Congress who were on the fence on the certification issue now decide to certify Biden’s victories because they don’t feel as much need to align with Trump. I think it is very likely that Republicans like Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney who were already opposed to this anti-certification push will feel even more emboldened to blast the moves by Trump and his allies on Capitol Hill. It’s also pretty likely that the media and Washington, D.C. officials will treat the pro-Trump activists in Washington less favorably since there’s more evidence that the 2020 election was in many ways a repudiation of Trump and Trumpism.
Finally, does Vice President Pence, whose allies were already signaling that he is unwilling to help Trump much in this certification process, just stand there and basically say and do nothing, even as he officially presides over the certification process? (Pence has no formal power to do anything that would affect the results, regardless.)
All that said, it’s still very possible that the majority of Republican members of Congress decline to certify the election results in at least one of the states that Biden narrowly won.
A quick addendum to our morning post: Just after 8 a.m. this morning, Ossoff declared victory in a streamed speech. “It is with humility that I thank the people of Georgia for electing me to serve you in the United States Senate. Thank you for the confidence and trust that you have placed in me,” he said.
ABC News has not projected a winner in the race, but as we noted a few minutes ago, it is looking good for Ossoff.
Where Things Stand Wednesday Morning
Good morning, live blog readers! We hope you got some rest; you may need it today.
If you went to sleep at a reasonable time on the East Coast Tuesday night, it was probably when about 95 percent of the expected vote in Georgia had been counted and both Senate races remained exceptionally close. At that time, the votes left to be counted were from predominantly blue areas, especially metro Atlanta and its suburbs. We and just about everyone else expected both Democratic candidates to pull ahead eventually — Warnock easily and Ossoff a little less easily.
Well, that happened, and is still in the process of happening. Both Warnock and Ossoff now lead with about 98 percent of the expected vote tabulated. Warnock’s lead is big enough — now up to 2 percentage points — that ABC News and other networks projected him as the winner at around 2 a.m. Wednesday. He becomes Georgia’s first-ever Black senator, and only the second Black senator elected in the South since Reconstruction.
Ossoff’s edge is slimmer at 0.4 percentage points or just over 16,000 votes (although even that is more than Biden’s winning margin in the state). But the votes left to be counted are still disproportionately from areas where the Democrats have been outperforming, so Ossoff’s advantage over Perdue is likely to grow. (Ossoff’s victory would clinch Senate control for Democrats.)
Where exactly are votes left? Still mostly Atlanta and its suburbs, but there will be drips and drabs everywhere. Reports differ, but …
- The biggest batch is in DeKalb County, which has about 19,000 votes left to count, according to Politico’s reporting. That counting will resume at 10 a.m., per CNN.
- Fulton County has about 4,000 absentee votes left, and will start uploading again at 8:30 a.m.
- Chatham County (Savannah) reportedly has about 3,000 mail votes left to count.
- And there are far smaller handfuls of votes left to be counted in many other counties around the state, and military and oversees ballots, which can arrive as late as Friday.
If you simply go by The New York Times’s estimate of the remaining vote to count, you get roughly the same picture: The Times thinks there are about 73,000 votes left to count, most of which — by geography and vote type — favors the Democrats.
In any case, we’ll be watching those last votes get counted today, and seeing when/if networks project Ossoff as the winner. We’re also keeping our eye on the vote to certify the presidential election results in Congress today. That could get … messy (even though the outcome isn’t in doubt). Stay tuned!
We’re Taking A Break, But We’ll See You Early Tomorrow
This post has been updated, as of 2:16 a.m. ET to reflect ABC News’s projection for Warnock in the special Senate election.
Well, even though 98 percent of the expected vote is in, according to ABC News, we’re going to call it a night and check back in early tomorrow. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has said that not all of the vote will be counted this evening. He told CNN earlier that he expects that we’ll have a “better idea” of where things stand by noon tomorrow.
As for where things stand now? Warnock has been projected as the winner by ABC News and Ossoff leads Perdue by less than a percentage point — or a few thousand votes. The races are, in other words, incredibly close.
However, the vote that still needs to be counted is thought to be in mostly Democratic-leaning counties, as you can see in this map from The New York Times, so at this point, it seems as if Ossoff stands a good chance of continuing to build his lead over Perdue.
If this is accurate, this will be a historic election for Georgia — Democrats will have a majority in the Senate and Georgia will elect its first Black senator and its first Jewish senator.
CORRECTION (Jan. 6, 2:15 a.m. ET): Earlier this post had said that Ossoff would be the first Jewish politician to hold statewide office in Georgia. That is inaccurate. Sam Olens is Jewish and was first elected Attorney General in 2010.
One takeaway from the results tonight is that Republican fears seem to have materialized when it came to runoff turnout. They were concerned that their base voters might not be as motivated to turn out because of Trump’s rhetoric surrounding election fraud and the legitimacy of the vote in November. There was a lag in early voting in heavily Republican areas, such as northwest Georgia, so the GOP hoped that Election Day turnout would make up for it. However, if we look at counties where 99 percent of the expected vote has been reported, it seems Republicans were right to be worried. As the chart below shows, the more heavily a county backed Trump in the November general election, the more its runoff turnout tended to drop relative the general.
“Will we love our neighbors as ourselves?” says Warnock, in one of several biblical references in his speech. This is a very COVID-19-era speech, as he is wearing a suit and tie but speaking from what looks like his home office. Warnock makes numerous references to his parents and Dr. King. He’s giving a very personal speech that sounded more like a sermon than a political address. “God bless you, Georgia, and God bless these United States of America,” he concludes.
Warnock mentions Morehouse College, John Lewis and Martin Luther King Jr. at the top of his speech. “Georgia, I am honored,” he says, basically declaring victory.
My final thought for tonight is that if both Democrats win — and it looks like they will — the 2020 elections will go down as having been a lot better for Democrats than a lot people thought at 10 p.m. on Nov. 3. I wouldn’t call it a blue 🌊 or anything like that — Democrats won a bunch of races and states by the barest of margins, and they lost seats in the House. But given that (i) partisan polarization is king, and (ii) many of our political systems skew the public will toward Republicans (House district lines, the Senate, the Electoral College, etc.), maybe this is what counts as a decisive result? In any case, we need to start differentiating a lot more clearly between electoral outcomes and public opinion and political will, if that makes any sense. (Maybe it doesn’t … I’m tired.)
Much, much easier to say: The Biden presidency now looks very different. The political transformation of the suburbs is real. Warnock made history. And I don’t think Trump is good for the GOP’s electoral prospects?
Such a big night if Democrats win both races — gaining a trifecta in Washington, taking away power from Mitch McConnell, winning two Senate seats in Georgia, getting a Black candidate elected in the South.
Staring down the barrel of losing the Senate, Republicans do have one consolation prize today: They will probably keep the seat on the Georgia Public Service Commission that was also on the ballot today. The Republican candidate currently has a 86,178-vote lead, and The New York Times estimates there are only about 92,000 ballots left to count.
I’ve asked plenty of people over the past four years — at this site and otherwise — if the Democrats’ road to redemption is likely to run through the Rust Belt or Sun Belt. In 2020, it was a bit of both, but neither overwhelmingly. In the future it will be the Sun Belt. (At least that’s my 2 cents)
On a logical level, I knew Democrats had a chance to win today. (I even wrote a whole half-article about it!) But I find myself unable to get over how shocking it would be. Runoffs in Georgia have historically been where Democratic dreams go to die. Yet somehow, it looks like they are going to be able to improve their vote share from November and pull out a victory, two feats that Democrats have only accomplished once before in Georgia history. This was probably made possible, too, by the ridiculously high turnout today: 4.4 million votes! That’s twice as many as any other runoff in Georgia history, and even higher than the 2016 general election! If you had told me a few months ago that all these things would happen, I would have laughed in your face.
CNN reports the following notable vote tallies are left:
- 20,000 to 25,000 votes left in Fulton County.
- 19,000 votes left in DeKalb County.
- Almost 5,000 votes left in Gwinnett County.
- 7,000 votes left in deep-red Coffee County in south Georgia.
- 3,000 votes in Chatham County (Savannah).
So most of what is left is in pretty Democratic territory.
How counties are voting in the regular Senate runoff
The current margins, by county, for the Georgia Senate race between Sen. David Perdue (R) and Jon Ossoff (D) and how that margin compares to the county’s final Nov. presidential margin
| county | County size | Cand. Margin | Pres. Margin | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cherokee | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+41.2 | R+39.2 | R+2.0 |
| Forsyth | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+36.2 | R+33.2 | R+3.0 |
| Paulding | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+26.8 | R+29.1 | D+2.3 |
| Carroll | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+38.1 | R+39.0 | D+0.9 |
| Walton | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+49.1 | R+49.2 | D+0.1 |
| Bartow | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+50.1 | R+50.7 | D+0.6 |
| Lowndes | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+13.5 | R+12.0 | R+1.5 |
| Rockdale | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+44.7 | D+40.8 | D+3.9 |
| Glynn | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+25.4 | R+23.2 | R+2.2 |
| Jackson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+58.4 | R+58.0 | R+0.3 |
| Whitfield | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+41.8 | R+40.7 | R+1.1 |
| Catoosa | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+56.7 | R+55.9 | R+0.8 |
| Effingham | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+48.7 | R+49.5 | D+0.9 |
| Spalding | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.5 | R+20.8 | D+2.2 |
| Bulloch | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+24.8 | R+23.7 | R+1.1 |
| Oconee | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+37.8 | R+33.5 | R+4.3 |
| Habersham | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+65.0 | R+64.0 | R+1.0 |
| Tift | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+34.4 | R+33.6 | R+0.8 |
| Dawson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+69.0 | R+67.9 | R+1.2 |
| Monroe | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+42.9 | R+42.8 | R+0.1 |
| Union | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+63.8 | R+63.3 | R+0.4 |
| Lumpkin | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+58.8 | R+58.2 | R+0.6 |
| Murray | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+68.7 | R+69.2 | D+0.4 |
| Jones | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+32.2 | R+33.9 | D+1.6 |
| Fannin | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+64.6 | R+64.6 | D+0.0 |
| Ware | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+39.6 | R+40.4 | D+0.8 |
| Upson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+31.4 | R+34.1 | D+2.7 |
| Wayne | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+55.6 | R+57.1 | D+1.5 |
| Hart | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+48.8 | R+49.6 | D+0.7 |
| Sumter | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+5.7 | D+4.8 | D+0.9 |
| Putnam | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+41.7 | R+40.9 | R+0.9 |
| Decatur | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+17.9 | R+17.0 | R+0.9 |
| Greene | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+30.3 | R+26.5 | R+3.8 |
| Toombs | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+46.5 | R+45.2 | R+1.3 |
| Meriwether | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.5 | R+20.6 | D+2.0 |
| Franklin | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+70.8 | R+69.4 | R+1.4 |
| Grady | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+33.6 | R+31.9 | R+1.7 |
| McDuffie | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+19.2 | R+19.1 | R+0.1 |
| Chattooga | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+59.4 | R+61.8 | D+2.4 |
| Washington | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+2.5 | D+0.8 | D+1.7 |
| Elbert | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+37.9 | R+36.5 | R+1.4 |
| Pierce | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+75.9 | R+75.1 | R+0.7 |
| Lamar | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+40.0 | R+41.0 | D+1.0 |
| Mitchell | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+9.7 | R+10.5 | D+0.8 |
| Oglethorpe | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+38.1 | R+38.8 | D+0.7 |
| Crisp | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+24.8 | R+24.9 | D+0.1 |
| Towns | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+61.5 | R+60.6 | R+0.9 |
| Brantley | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+81.4 | R+81.2 | R+0.2 |
| Berrien | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+65.8 | R+66.5 | D+0.7 |
| Jasper | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+51.4 | R+53.1 | D+1.8 |
| Jefferson | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+8.3 | D+6.8 | D+1.5 |
| Dade | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+64.4 | R+64.6 | D+0.2 |
| Brooks | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+21.0 | R+20.7 | R+0.3 |
| Cook | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+39.0 | R+40.4 | D+1.4 |
| Screven | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.6 | R+18.9 | D+0.3 |
| Ben Hill | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+23.6 | R+26.2 | D+2.6 |
| Jeff Davis | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+62.8 | R+63.5 | D+0.8 |
| Bleckley | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+53.5 | R+52.9 | R+0.6 |
| Long | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+22.6 | R+26.4 | D+3.8 |
| Heard | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+66.6 | R+68.5 | D+1.9 |
| Early | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+4.1 | R+5.0 | D+0.9 |
| Wilkes | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+14.0 | R+13.2 | R+0.8 |
| Bacon | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+73.1 | R+72.7 | R+0.4 |
| Charlton | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+50.6 | R+50.7 | D+0.1 |
| Candler | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+42.1 | R+42.1 | R+0.0 |
| Evans | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+35.9 | R+36.8 | D+0.9 |
| Johnson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+41.6 | R+39.7 | R+1.9 |
| Seminole | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+34.4 | R+34.9 | D+0.5 |
| Turner | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+23.5 | R+24.8 | D+1.2 |
| Marion | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+24.3 | R+26.6 | D+2.3 |
| Lanier | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+40.3 | R+41.7 | D+1.3 |
| Wilcox | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+46.4 | R+47.0 | D+0.6 |
| Randolph | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+12.9 | D+9.1 | D+3.8 |
| Schley | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+57.8 | R+58.8 | D+1.0 |
| Chattahoochee | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+8.2 | R+13.5 | D+5.3 |
| Glascock | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+80.4 | R+79.7 | R+0.7 |
| Echols | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+78.1 | R+75.6 | R+2.5 |
| Clay | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+11.2 | D+10.7 | D+0.5 |
| Webster | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+11.7 | R+7.8 | R+4.0 |
How counties are voting in the special Senate runoff
The current margins, by county, for the Georgia Senate race between Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R) and Raphael Warnock (D) and how that margin compares to the county’s final Nov. presidential margin
| county | County size | Cand. Margin | Pres. Margin | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cherokee | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+40.0 | R+39.2 | R+0.8 |
| Forsyth | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+34.9 | R+33.2 | R+1.7 |
| Paulding | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+26.1 | R+29.1 | D+3.0 |
| Carroll | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+37.2 | R+39.0 | D+1.8 |
| Walton | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+48.5 | R+49.2 | D+0.7 |
| Bartow | ◼️◼️◻️ | R+49.2 | R+50.7 | D+1.5 |
| Lowndes | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+13.4 | R+12.0 | R+1.4 |
| Rockdale | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+45.1 | D+40.8 | D+4.3 |
| Glynn | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+25.3 | R+23.2 | R+2.1 |
| Jackson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+57.5 | R+58.0 | D+0.5 |
| Whitfield | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+41.9 | R+40.7 | R+1.2 |
| Catoosa | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+56.9 | R+55.9 | R+1.0 |
| Effingham | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+48.7 | R+49.5 | D+0.8 |
| Spalding | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+17.9 | R+20.8 | D+2.9 |
| Bulloch | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+24.7 | R+23.7 | R+1.0 |
| Oconee | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+36.3 | R+33.5 | R+2.8 |
| Habersham | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+64.0 | R+64.0 | R+0.0 |
| Tift | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+34.0 | R+33.6 | R+0.4 |
| Dawson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+68.4 | R+67.9 | R+0.5 |
| Monroe | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+42.5 | R+42.8 | D+0.3 |
| Union | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+63.6 | R+63.3 | R+0.3 |
| Lumpkin | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+58.1 | R+58.2 | D+0.1 |
| Murray | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+68.8 | R+69.2 | D+0.3 |
| Jones | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+32.0 | R+33.9 | D+1.9 |
| Fannin | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+63.7 | R+64.6 | D+0.9 |
| Ware | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+39.6 | R+40.4 | D+0.9 |
| Upson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+30.8 | R+34.1 | D+3.3 |
| Wayne | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+56.0 | R+57.1 | D+1.2 |
| Hart | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+49.2 | R+49.6 | D+0.4 |
| Sumter | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+6.0 | D+4.8 | D+1.3 |
| Putnam | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+41.1 | R+40.9 | R+0.2 |
| Decatur | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.0 | R+17.0 | R+1.0 |
| Greene | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+29.2 | R+26.5 | R+2.7 |
| Toombs | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+46.0 | R+45.2 | R+0.7 |
| Meriwether | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.0 | R+20.6 | D+2.5 |
| Franklin | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+70.8 | R+69.4 | R+1.4 |
| Grady | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+33.5 | R+31.9 | R+1.6 |
| McDuffie | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.8 | R+19.1 | D+0.4 |
| Chattooga | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+59.1 | R+61.8 | D+2.7 |
| Washington | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+3.0 | D+0.8 | D+2.2 |
| Elbert | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+38.2 | R+36.5 | R+1.7 |
| Pierce | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+76.1 | R+75.1 | R+1.0 |
| Lamar | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+39.2 | R+41.0 | D+1.8 |
| Mitchell | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+9.3 | R+10.5 | D+1.2 |
| Oglethorpe | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+37.4 | R+38.8 | D+1.4 |
| Crisp | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+24.3 | R+24.9 | D+0.7 |
| Towns | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+60.9 | R+60.6 | R+0.3 |
| Brantley | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+81.5 | R+81.2 | R+0.2 |
| Berrien | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+65.7 | R+66.5 | D+0.8 |
| Jasper | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+50.5 | R+53.1 | D+2.6 |
| Jefferson | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+8.8 | D+6.8 | D+2.0 |
| Dade | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+64.9 | R+64.6 | R+0.3 |
| Brooks | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+21.1 | R+20.7 | R+0.4 |
| Cook | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+39.0 | R+40.4 | D+1.4 |
| Screven | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+18.1 | R+18.9 | D+0.9 |
| Ben Hill | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+23.3 | R+26.2 | D+2.8 |
| Jeff Davis | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+63.1 | R+63.5 | D+0.4 |
| Bleckley | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+52.5 | R+52.9 | D+0.3 |
| Long | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+22.3 | R+26.4 | D+4.1 |
| Heard | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+65.8 | R+68.5 | D+2.7 |
| Early | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+4.5 | R+5.0 | D+0.5 |
| Wilkes | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+13.8 | R+13.2 | R+0.6 |
| Bacon | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+73.0 | R+72.7 | R+0.3 |
| Charlton | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+51.2 | R+50.7 | R+0.5 |
| Candler | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+42.3 | R+42.1 | R+0.2 |
| Evans | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+35.8 | R+36.8 | D+1.1 |
| Johnson | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+41.4 | R+39.7 | R+1.7 |
| Seminole | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+34.6 | R+34.9 | D+0.3 |
| Turner | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+23.3 | R+24.8 | D+1.5 |
| Marion | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+24.2 | R+26.6 | D+2.4 |
| Lanier | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+40.1 | R+41.7 | D+1.6 |
| Wilcox | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+46.2 | R+47.0 | D+0.8 |
| Randolph | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+13.1 | D+9.1 | D+4.0 |
| Schley | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+57.5 | R+58.8 | D+1.3 |
| Chattahoochee | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+8.9 | R+13.5 | D+4.6 |
| Glascock | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+80.9 | R+79.7 | R+1.3 |
| Echols | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+78.4 | R+75.6 | R+2.8 |
| Clay | ◼️◻️◻️ | D+11.2 | D+10.7 | D+0.4 |
| Webster | ◼️◻️◻️ | R+12.2 | R+7.8 | R+4.4 |
Adding some context to Nate’s comment about only Black Republicans (no Democrats) being elected to the Senate from the South, historically: During Reconstruction, two Black Republicans from Mississippi served in the Senate — Hiram Revels and Blanche K. Bruce. It was, of course, a very different Republican Party. Black Americans overwhelmingly voted for Republicans and made up a majority of the population in Mississippi at the time. Post-Reconstruction, Black Americans were disenfranchised, and in many places they were not elected to Congress again until after the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
The Cook Political Report’s Dave Wasserman, who has one of the faster election-projecting trigger fingers, has called the regular Senate election for Ossoff. However, no media outlet has issued a projection yet.
The specific estimate in DeKalb is around 20,000 more advance votes to count. It’s not clear if those will be counted tonight.
Yeah, and some of the still-to-be-tallied votes may have been delayed by people blocking and harassing elections workers.
“Fulton and DeKalb are going to have big swaths of votes,” says Georgia voting systems manager Gabriel Sterling in a press conference right now. Those are very blue counties and are likely going to be enough to put Ossoff over the top. A dozen or so other counties also have smaller batches of votes outstanding, though. Officials are encouraging counties to report everything by 1 p.m. tomorrow.
One reason why The New York Times’s needle is still bullish on Ossoff wining? They expect most of the outstanding vote in DeKalb to be from majority Black precincts:
Still, though, if Ossoff and Warnock both win, there will have been at least 17,000 voters who split their tickets.
Mitch McConnell has been perhaps the most important person in the U.S. government since 2014, particularly with Trump often so disengaged from policy issues. So if he is no longer the Senate majority leader, as seems likely right now, that is of course a huge, huge shift. He stops bills that a majority of senators support from going to the floor. He singlehandedly blocks Democratic priorities. He really controls the agenda in the chamber. A Senate where Joe Manchin is the 51st Democratic vote is not a liberal Senate, but it’s well to the left of one where McConnell decides what gets voted on in the first place. Loeffler and Perdue have been fairly unremarkable senators. But their votes to make McConnell the majority leader were hugely important.
Warnock is, in all probability, going to be the first Black Democrat ever elected to the Senate from the South. (There have been Black Republicans, such as current Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina.)
Starting to get firmer numbers on the number of ballots remaining. This should be more than enough for Ossoff to take a lead.
Want to see what a realignment looks like? Cobb County (94 percent of the expected vote reporting) and Gwinnett County (98 percent reporting) — both in the Atlanta suburbs — voted for Mitt Romney by 12 points and 9 points respectively. Tonight, they are voting for Warnock by 16 points and 21 points, respectively.
It’s just very hard to see a path back for either Republican. It would most likely have to involve major tabulation errors, which can happen, but the Democrats have a lot more votes left to pad their margins.
Here are some other governing implications for a 51-50 Senate controlled by Democrats, per Larry Levitt of the Kaiser Family Foundation:
Perdue’s lead is now down to less than 500 votes, per ABC’s count.
The biggest thing that springs to mind for me, Micah, is more comprehensive and broad pandemic relief. Even with a 50-50 senate, I think there would be enough support to pass, say, $2,000 stimulus checks and funding for local and state governments.
I don’t think much suddenly becomes possible, Micah. A 50-50 Senate could have trouble passing relatively popular Democratic proposals like election reform or a public option for health care, let alone progressive priorities like the Green New Deal or Medicare for All. The biggest thing is probably that it will allow Biden to confirm judges and Cabinet officials without too much trouble. Basically, a governing trifecta isn’t that valuable when one Democratic senator (moderate Joe Manchin?) or six Democratic House members can hold your agenda hostage.
For one, Micah, Stephen Breyer would take a big sigh of relief and very likely retire from the Supreme Court.
So let’s say Warnock and Ossoff win … what are the policies and events that suddenly become possible or likely over the next two years that wouldn’t be with a GOP Senate?
https://twitter.com/imillhiser/status/1346670180190007304
Vox’s Ian Millhiser is one of the best chroniclers of the courts that I know, so I think his speculation is worth considering. And it’s interesting. I had never understood why Merrick Garland was on Biden’s short list for attorney general and why Biden had not already picked someone to run the DOJ. But it’s an interesting idea that perhaps Ketanji Brown Jackson, who is currently on the federal district court in Washington, D.C., might get appointed as a circuit court judge to replace Garland and then at some point in Biden’s term, she’d replace Breyer and be the first-ever Black woman on the Supreme Court.
But that’s a lot of moves. Maybe it’s just that Republicans would have opposed Sally Yates and she will be the Attorney General if Democrats don’t need any Republican votes.
Perdue’s lead now down to about 3,500 votes, with what’s left almost all likely to be pretty blue.
In counties with over 95 percent of the expected vote reporting, Ossoff is overperforming Biden in most of them — those are the dots above the line. The dots are sized by the number of votes cast.
This is a good thread on why things look very tough for Republicans, especially for Loeffler but probably for Perdue, too.
With 95 percent of the expected vote in, Perdue leads Ossoff by about 0.4 points, while Warnock leads Loeffler by about 0.5 points. But based on what the votes that are still outstanding, it looks like both Democrats are favored. Only around 80 percent of the expected vote is in from Chatham County (Savannah) and Henry County in the Atlanta metro area, and The New York Times estimates there are perhaps another 85,000 or so votes left in Fulton and DeKalb counties, which the city of Atlanta straddles.
Democrats will be glad to take control of the Senate, if they do indeed win tonight. But this election is important for the long-term electoral map beyond the current two-year congressional session. Democrats have lost a lot of ground in the Midwest over the past decade plus. If Ohio and Iowa are off the table for them, and if Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania are going to be nail-biters, then Democrats need to be picking up ground in the Sun Belt to be competitive in the Electoral College.
How quickly you forget, Micah! We just had a recount in Georgia! A campaign can request a recount there if the margin is within 0.5 percentage points.
I’m getting a little ahead of things here, but can someone tell me about the recount thresholds in Georgia?
With those DeKalb results ingested, the needle thinks both Democrats are more than 95 percent likely to win their Georgia races.
So it seems like some more Warnock projections could be imminent?
With that big vote dump from DeKalb, Warnock has now taken a 32,013-vote lead, and Perdue’s lead has been cut to just 3,121 votes.