Georgia runoff results – live: Warnock’s win cements Democrats 2024 blueprint as women celebrate Walker’s loss
Warnock’s victory gives Democrats a 51-49 majority in the Senate
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Democratic incumbent Senator Raphael Warnock sailed to victory over Republican challenger Herschel Walker on Tuesday night as the two candidates went head-to-head in the runoff race for Georgia’s crucial Senate seat.
The race was called in Mr Warnock’s favour at around 10.30pm, sending him to Washington DC for a full six-year term and giving Democrats a 51-49 majority in the Senate.
Following Mr Walker’s defeat, several of his former partners and the football star’s son celebrated the election results.
One woman who had a relationship with him in 2006 told The Daily Beast that it spelled a victory for the many women who had come forward to accuse him of encouraging them to have abortions or of being absent from his children’s lives – claims that directly contradicted the stance Mr Walker ran on.
“The Senate race tonight not only vindicates that democracy has won but the women that he betrayed, have won,” she said.
In a lengthy Twitter thread, Mr Walker’s son Christian Walker also branded his father “pathetic” and claimed that he had ignored everyone but Donald Trump around whether or not he should have ran.
An increasingly personal fight and a flood of outside spending all comes to a head today
Georgia voters on Tuesday are set to decide the final Senate contest in the country, choosing between Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and Republican football legend Herschel Walker after a four-week runoff blitz that has drawn a flood of outside spending to an increasingly personal fight.
Read on:
Warnock or Walker? Georgia runoff to settle last Senate seat
Georgia voters are set to decide the final Senate contest in the country
What to watch for in today’s election
The results of the AP VoteCast survey illustrate some of the challenges each candidate faces on Tuesday.
Herschel Walker will need to turn out a GOP base that wasn’t enamored with him to start with, and do it without the more popular Governor Brian Kemp on the ballot.
Raphael Warnock must get his coalition of some lower-propensity voting groups to turn out.
And both candidates have to motivate voters despite a predetermined balance of power in Washington.
What to watch in Tuesday's Georgia Senate runoff election
The extended Senate campaign in Georgia gives Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and Republican challenger Herschel Walker a second chance to persuade voters to send them to Washington
A stark choice for Black voters
Black voters say the choice is stark: Warnock, the senior minister of Martin Luther King’s Atlanta church, echoes traditional liberal notions of the Black experience; and Walker, a University of Georgia football icon, speaks the language of white cultural conservatism and mocks Warnock’s interpretations of King, among other matters.
Read on:
Warnock, Walker: Starkly different choices for Black voters
Raphael Warnock is the first Black U.S. senator from Georgia, having broken the color barrier with a special election victory in January 2021
Watch: Today is a ‘mini-referendum’ on Trump
“This is a mini referendum on the value, or lack thereof, of a Trump endorsement,” says CBS News’ Chief Washington Correspondent Major Garrett
What influence does Trump have on today’s race?
Donald Trump remains the de facto leader of the Republican Party, meaning its elected officials must answer for every egregious statement or call to subvert the law he makes. The difference is that now, after two impeachments and suffering a crushing loss in 2020, he no longer offers them many benefits. Rather, every utterance he makes reminds voters why they don’t vote for Republicans.
Nowhere is this clearer than in Georgia’s Senate runoff, writes Eric Garcia.
Trump saddles GOP with all of his baggage and none of his benefits
He holds no office and his popularity is waning. But Republicans are stuck with his candidates and having to answer for his every word
DoJ to monitor polls in Georgia for compliance with federal voting rights laws
The Justice Department plans to monitor compliance with federal voting rights laws in four counties in Georgia today, the department said in a statement.
Since the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965, the Civil Rights Division has regularly monitored elections in the field in jurisdictions around the country to protect the rights of voters. The Civil Rights Division enforces the federal voting rights laws that protect the rights of all citizens to access the ballot.
For this election, the Civil Rights Division will monitor for compliance with the federal voting rights laws on Election Day in four jurisdictions: Cobb County, Fulton County, Gwinnett County, and Macon-Bibb County. Monitors will include personnel from the Civil Rights Division and from the US Attorneys’ Offices.
The Civil Rights Division’s Voting Section enforces the civil provisions of federal statutes that protect the right to vote, including the Voting Rights Act, the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act, the National Voter Registration Act, the Help America Vote Act, and the Civil Rights Acts.
What time will we know the results?
Polls in Georgia open at 7:00 am and close at 7:00 pm on Tuesday. Voters who are still in line by 7:00 pm will still be allowed to vote.
Results of the race will likely be known earlier than in the 2021 runoff, due largely to the fact that many voters have already cast their ballot.
When will we know the Georgia Senate runoff results?
The large number of people who voted early means that results might come earlier than expected.
Polls close in Georgia in runoff to decide control of Senate
Polls are officially closed in Georgia for the runoff race between Raphael Warnock and Herschel Walker, though those in line now will still be able to cast their choice in the Senate race.
It’s unclear when we’ll know who won.
Unofficial results will be posted online shortly, but official tallies depend on turnout and how quickly individual counties share their voter data with state authorities.
We’ll be monitoring all the latest developments.
Eric Garcia has more information.
When will we know the Georgia Senate runoff results?
The large number of people who voted early means that results might come earlier than expected.
Results start rolling in for Georgia Senate runoff
It’s official, moments after polls closed in Georgia, we have our first counties sharing voter totals, though it’s still only a few hundred thousand votes, with just 10 per cent of counties reporting.
As expected, incumbent Democrat Raphael Warnock, who currently holds the lead in this provisional total, is carrying urban counties near the cities of Atlanta, Augusta, and Macon, while Herschel Walker is winning in redder, more rural counties.
Follow the latest prelimary tallies here, based on Associated Press data.
And here is the state of Georgia’s official elections counter.
Did Herschel Walker ever really live in Georgia?
Herschel Walker, the scandal-plagued Republican candidate in the Senate runoff election in Georgia, said he lives in Texas in a newly unearthed recording.
In a January speech to the University of Georgia’s College Republicans, the former football star stated plainly, “I live in Texas,” despite competing against Democrat Raphael Warnock for Georgia’s US Senate seat.
“Everyone asks me, why did I decide to run for a Senate seat? Because to be honest with you, this is never something I ever, ever, ever thought in my life I’d ever do,” Mr Walker told the club, according to a report from CNN’s KFILE.
The revelation follows a previous CNN report that Mr Walker claimed a tax break on his multi-million dollar Texas home in 2021 and 2022 intended for primary residents, saving himself an estimated $1,500 and potentially running afoul of both Texas tax law and Georgia election procedures.
Here’s the full story.
Herschel Walker says ‘I live in Texas’ in unearthed 2022 recording
Opponents on the right and left have questioned GOP candidate’s residency
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