Staff Reports
In Georgia, over 1.8 million people have already voted early in the state's Senate runoff election, which will be held on December 6. On the final day of early voting, 353,000 people cast their ballots.
According to the Secretary of State's data, over 1.8 million female voters cast their ballots early. The total number of early voters in the state was 1,868,127.
The number of people who voted early exceeded the number of people who did so in the November elections. In the state's recent elections, around 1.5 million people had cast their ballots before the election.
Despite the high number of early voters, the total number of people who participated in the elections is lower than in the previous presidential election. In 2020, around 2.5 million Georgians voted early. The state's midterm elections usually draw smaller groups of voters.
In the previous Senate runoff election in 2021, about 4.5 million voters participated. The victory of Raphael Warnock, a Democrat, led to a 50-50 tie in the Senate. With the help of the vice president's tiebreaking vote, the Democrats gained the upper hand.
In November, Raphael Warnock was able to win 54% of the early votes, while Republican candidate Herschel Walker was able to secure 56% of the Election Day votes.
After no candidate was able to secure a majority of the votes in the previous election, the Senate runoff election was held. Raphael Warnock won with 49.4%, while Walker was at 48.5%. Chase Oliver, a third-party candidate, received 2.1% of the total votes.
A law passed in 2021 made the Senate runoff election in Georgia last for four weeks instead of nine weeks.
The Senate runoff election in the state follows a similar pattern to the one that occurred in the previous election. In the previous cycle, Jon Ossoff, a Democrat, and Raphael Warnock, a Republican, were forced into a January runoff after the general election in 2020. They were able to defeat the two Republican incumbents, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler.
The outcome of the Senate runoff election between Walker and Warnock will have significant national implications as the Democrats currently hold a 49-49 advantage following the midterms.
If the Democrats win the Senate runoff election, they would gain an advantage in the selection of committee members and other important areas of the Senate. A victory for Walker would leave the Senate at a 50-50 level, which is the same as it was following the recent elections.
The preceding is a summary of an article that originally appeared on Daily Wire.
