By Lauren Victoria Burke, NNPA Newswire Contributor
Georgia shattered its single-day record for early voting this week. In the run-up to the December 6th U.S. Senate run-off election between Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock and former football running back Herschel Walker, voters are engaged like never before.
Over 300,000 voters in Georgia voted early on Monday, November 28. The number shattered the previous record of 233,000 voters who voted early in one day. That record was set in 2018.
The early voting record is generally seen as a warning sign for the Georgia Republican Party as grass roots voting activists on the ground mostly lean left. Led by Black Voters Matter, that activism can be seen on social media and featured on Roland Martin Unfiltered over the last few weeks.
A widely covered and well attended visit to Georgia by former President Barack Obama on Dec. 1, was likely even more of a boost to motivate voters on the Democratic side.
Though Georgia has historically been a red state over the last twenty years, the 2020 election between President Biden and former President Donald Trump demonstrated that an engaged strategy for voter turnout focused on Black votes resulted in a successful outcome for Democrats.
The Republican Party has taken positions against early voting and mail-in voting. Over 139,915 absentee ballots have been returned in Georgia so far.
The competition between Senator Warnock and Walker is important because it impacts which party will drive policy in the U.S. Senate. Even though the Democrats will, at the very least, be in procedural control, if the Senate is 50-50, the U.S. Senate will be 51-49 in the Democrat’s favor if Sen. Warnock wins in Georgia.
Lauren Victoria Burke is an independent journalist and the host of the podcast BURKEFILE. She is a political analyst who appears regularly on #RolandMartinUnfiltered. She may be contacted at [email protected] and on twitter at @LVBurke
