If you live in Georgia, and you’re looking for a break from politics now that we know who will be the next President, then I have bad news for you. Control of the U.S. Senate hangs in the balance, and Georgia will decide who it falls to. Get ready for a holiday season full of nasty political attack ads before the runoff election on January 5.
Due to the mid-term resignation of former Sen. Isakson, Georgia has to hold elections for both of its Senate seats. Georgia has a law on the books leftover from the Jim Crow era that if no candidate garners a majority of the vote in a Senate race, then a second “runoff” election is held on the first Tuesday of the following year, with only the top-two candidates in the race. No candidate got 50% in either race. As luck would have it, Republicans have secured 50 Senate seats, and Democrats 48. Because VP Kamala Harris would break ties in the Senate, Democrats could still claim control of the Senate by the narrowest of margins if they win both Senate seats.
What gives Democrats hope is that Joe Biden appears to have won the state by less than a point, thanks to a blue surge in the Atlanta metro area. The upside for Republicans is that in both races, Republicans combined for a slightly higher percentage of the vote than Democrats. Split-ticket voting was more commonplace then anticipated in 2020, and it usually favored Joe Biden and Republicans down ballot.
The Candidates
In the regular election, Democrats nominated Jon Ossoff. He’s a former Congressional candidate, falling short in a special election by 4 points in 2017, in a suburban congressional district that Biden won. Since then, Ossoff has improved his campaign skills and is a much more compelling candidate. Georgia has clearly become more blue, the district Ossoff failed to flip was won comfortably by Democrats on November 3. Ossoff plans on making COVID-19 a big issue in his campaign. While people are unsatisfied with Georgia’s response to the virus, this messaging could backfire if he speaks favorably of economic lockdowns. He faces incumbent right-wing Senator David Perdue. In the first round on November 3, Perdue beat Ossoff 49.7% to 48%.
In the special election, Democrats nominated Raphael Warnock, the lead pastor at Saint Ebenezer’s Church in Atlanta, one of the nation’s largest black churches. Unfortunately, that’s where his sainthood ends. The opposition research binder on Warnock is bulging, with incidents such as running over his wife’s foot during a domestic fight, calling Israel an Apartheid State after the Embassy was moved to Jerusalem, and youth pastoring at a church that hosted and praised Fidel Castro. Warnock faces interim Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who was appointed after Sen. Isakson’s resignation. Loeffler has kept a lower profile through her short time in the Senate. In the first round, Warnock beat Loeffler 32.9% to 25.9%. But 20% of the vote went to fellow Republican Doug Collins, while only 13.5% of the vote was cast for other Democrats.
Both Perdue and Loeffler have made vote counting a key issue of their campaigns, calling on GOP Georgia Secretary of State Chad Raffensperger to resign after Biden took a small lead in Georgia, after Trump had been in the lead for days and Perdue fell below 50%. Neither believe Donald Trump has lost yet. This infighting could backfire, as people could interpret this as the two not wanting all of the votes to be counted.
The Ratings
At this point, Jon Ossoff seems to be the Democrat that has the better chance of winning. Both elections will be held simultaneously, so there won’t be a whole lot of ticket splitting. Ultimately, it’s a turnout game. Which side will vote at higher rates? Will the prospect of Schumer, Pelosi, and Biden being the three most powerful people in America drive up Democratic enthusiasm or Republican fear?
There’s a lot we don’t know, and this race has a lot of time, nearly two months, to develop. Historically, runoff elections in Georgia are usually more favorable to Republicans. Given Democratic disappointments in Senate races elsewhere, my initial rating for both Georgia runoffs is Lean Republican.
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