Democrat Raphael Warnock makes history – wins U.S. Senate run-off election in Georgia

AFP | Democrat Raphael Warnock won the first Georgia run-off on Wednesday making way for his party to take back the US Senate from the Republicans.

Reverend Raphael Warnock’s victory, projected by multiple US networks overnight, capped a grueling 9-week runoff campaign and puts Georgia’s other knife-edge race in the spotlight for its potential to impact the balance of power in Washington.

“I promise you this tonight: I am going to the Senate to work for all of Georgia,” Warnock said in a livestream to supporters.

Warnock, 51, made history as just the third African American to win a Senate seat from the South. He defeated Kelly Loeffler, a 50-year-old businesswoman appointed to the Senate in December 2019.

LIVE: Reverend Warnock Addresses Supporters on Election Night https://t.co/3AjHzC35qy

— Reverend Raphael Warnock (@ReverendWarnock) January 6, 2021

Should Republicans lose the second race it would be a political debacle just hours before Trump is expected to suffer another bitter blow when Congress affirms Biden’s Electoral College victory.

Multiple Republicans have signaled they will try to block the certification of the vote. But their numbers appear slim and the House and Senate are all but guaranteed to reject the effort and certify the Electoral College results.

In the second race, Democrat Jon Ossoff’s campaign manager said in a statement that once all votes are counted they “fully expect” Ossoff will have defeated his Republican opponent.

With 97 percent of precincts reporting, Ossoff edged out to a 0.22 percent lead, and analysts have said he was well placed to win, with outstanding votes coming from Democratic-leaning regions such as Atlanta.

Such results would be a major political upset in a GOP bastion, a southern state that has been reliably Republican for 2 decades but which Biden won in an upset on November 3 as he marched to victory against Trump in the presidential race.

It would also send reverberations through Washington and the nation, as it would essentially hand Biden’s Democrats the levers of power in the executive branch and both chambers of Congress.

Democrats need both candidates to prevail in order to snatch the Senate from the Republicans. If Perdue holds on to win, Republicans preserve their Senate majority.

Democratic victories in Georgia – where a record 3 million-plus people voted early amid the Coronavirus pandemic – would break the runoff winning streak that Republicans have held in the statewide races since 1992.