Georgia's Very Own Megathread!

[ON Progressive]

What on earth is with Quitman County's massive swing? Not too worrying since it's not a large amount of votes at all, but it sticks out like a sore thumb.

[ON Progressive]

I want to see Barrow clear 50% tonight. He's the only SOS candidate with a shot of actually winning.

[ON Progressive]

Looks like Barrow may avoid the runoff. He is in the mid-40s in most of the Atlanta area, and has the majority of the vote in Fulton County. He's also getting huge majorities in the rest of the state.

[ON Progressive]

Looks like incumbent State Senator Curt Thompson will be primaried in the Safe D seat of GA SD-05. He is losing 67-33 right now.

One thing that stands out about Thompson is that he has some incredibly bizarre combination of endorsements. He has been endorsed by Democracy for America, the NRA, the Georgia Chamber of Commerce, the NRA, AND the American Cancer Society in the past.

[ON Progressive]

All the griping about Evan's formula for winning being outdated and such. What will people say when Abrams loses by close to double digits? Dems must breakthrough with whites in order to win there's no other way.

this primary result proves that the Evans campaign is FAR too incompetent to be allowed anywhere near a general election ballot. she couldn't even break 30% of the vote in lily-white suburbs/exurbs

Even in the south GA counties where the electorate was nothing but white DINOs (on account of competitive local elections that are still ancestrally decided in the democratic primary), Abrams still won -- with incredible margins, too!

How is Stacey Evans supposed to "breakthrough with whites" when she can't even win white voters in the Democratic primary?

BE COMPETITIVE AMONG WHITE VOTERS is what the statewide democratic candidates have tried to do in Georgia over and over again. It didn't work for Jim Barksdale, Michelle Nunn, Jason Carter, Carol Porter, or literally anyone else. Even the great John Barrow only won in 2012 thanks to his excellent campaign that simultaneously won over white voters (in a way no other GA politico can) AND used Obama's reelection campaign to boost black turnout to a level that part of the state had never before seen.

Don't you think it's time to try something else for a change?

She not only didn't win white voters, she almost certainly lost them by a huge margin. Losing counties like Union (56-44 Abrams) and Fannin (61-39 Abrams) by double digits are all I need to see to know she got blown out by Abrams among white voters.

[ON Progressive]

Which Stacey won Cobb County, Ga., the suburban GOP stronghold of Georgia?

Stacey Evans or Stacey Abrams?

Abrams won Cobb by a 74-26 margin

Which Democrat won white voters tonight and why?

Abrams almost certainly did. She won a lot of very white counties like Union, Fannin, Brantley, and Pierce.

[ON Progressive]

Is there any movement in GA to abolish general election runoffs? I am not a fan of them at all.

[ON Progressive]

I admittedly don’t know much about this race and haven’t read a lot of this thread but Dems are blowing heir chances by nominating far left candidates in lean red-purple states. Maybe Abrams is good for Hawaii or something but in Georgia, Evans was the right call.

All things being equal I think the moderate is the better choice but especially in this case

Abrams isn't a far left candidate whatsoever, and Evans had basically no GOTV operation while Abrams has a massive one. Abrams was absolutely the right call.

[ON Progressive]

Charlie Cook thinks this is Safe R, and I have no reason to question his expertise.

Holy crap, does he actually update his ratings to reflect reality? This is a guy who has Pennsylvania as Lean D and Illinois as a toss-up.

He hasn't updated his gubernatorial ratings in months, and it's annoying.

[ON Progressive]

Clay Tippins has Cagle on audio admitting he backed an education bill he thought was bad policy because it would hurt a group that would have poured money into Hill's campaign if he made the run-off.

https://www.wsbtv.com/news/2-investigates/secret-recording-cagle-says-he-backed-controversial-bill-for-politics-not-policy/764972739

Get on it Kemp!

This primary is going to get nasty, and I'm all for it.

[ON Progressive]

You must be logged in to read this quote.

If only these stories could have come out sooner. Kemp's probably going to win the primary easily at this rate.

[ON Progressive]

https://politics.myajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/why-kentucky-town-spotlight-georgia-governor-race/wf3mlriT9gqBvBACDoFfXI/

Brian Kemp's involvement in Hart AgStrong is getting scrutinized now, and it is not good.

[ON Progressive]

Hillary, Bernie, Biden, Booker, Harris... yeah national Democrats are going to be all in for this race.

I hope to see Biden, Booker, Harris, and Bernie barnstorming the state this fall. I am excited!

Georgia has a lot of transplants, people may scoff at these national endorsements, but yeah... nobody cares about Barnes, Cleland, Darden, and others. Their base of voters are either dead or Republicans at this point. Abrams is the beginning of a new dynasty of Georgia Democrats.

Not sure how Bernie would help tbh (and I'm a huge Bernie fan, so this isn't anything against him personally). He got creamed in the Dem primary in 2016 in GA, even in rural white areas.

[ON Progressive]

If only we could get a proper scandal on Kemp instead of all of them being on Cagle.

[ON Progressive]

Cagle says the quiet part out loud:

He's not wrong though.

[ON Progressive]

How much of the white vote do you guys think Stacey needs to win? I think 25% would be enough. Remember that Clinton did better than Obama in 2008, and Clinton actually did worse with white voters (21% vs. 23%).

[ON Progressive]

How much of the white vote do you guys think Stacey needs to win? I think 25% would be enough. Remember that Clinton did better than Obama in 2008, and Clinton actually did worse with white voters (21% vs. 23%).

I don’t know if 25% of whites would allow her to get to 50% plus one. Unless black turnout is AL-Sen 2017 levels of unprecedented. 28% or so is probably a more realistic bar.

That said, I’m pretty confident Barrow can reach that threshold among whites.

Is there any realistic path to Abrams getting even near 28% among whites barring a Roy Moore type scandal?

[ON Progressive]

Something several of y'all need to remember is that Georgia isn't first past the post. It's a runoff state in the general unless the winning candidate gets 50% + 1. And the Libertarian candidate usually gets somewhere around 2-3% of the vote in Georgia.

If election night looks like this:

Abrams: 49%
Kemp: 47%
Libertarian: 3%
Other/Write In: 1%

Abrams probably loses because runoffs have been a political death sentence for GA Dems recently. The question isn't whether Abrams can get more votes, it's whether she can get a majority the first time with third party candidates included.

This is not necessarily true. If a runoff were to occur, only voters who are enthusiastic, or regular voters would show up. Its quite possible that, due to the nature of the Trump era, it will be Abrams' voters who will show up. In special elections in GA, Dems have over preformed in runoffs, so I dont see why that would change for Abrams.

Dems have done horribly in state legislative specials in GA outside the Nov 7, 2017 elections though. They got creamed in both January specials. We couldn't even force a runoff in the 111th House District, a 50-47 Clinton seat, and way underperformed Clinton in SD-17 (she lost it 56.5 to 40.8, we lost overall 65.6 to 34.4 in the special).

We also didn't improve on Clinton at all in SD-32 in 2017, and underperformed Clinton in HD-175 in Feburary (Clinton got 36.6% in 2016, and we only got 23.5% in the special).

Low turnout elections like runoffs and special elections hurt Dems in GA, plain and simple.

[ON Progressive]

Awesome, the time is now!

Time was changed, results on NY released at 730 now.

Classic Georgia making us wait an eternity for results.

[ON Progressive]

lmao @ Cagle losing Rockdale by 30 points. I would've expected him to be winning that county, even in a loss.

[ON Progressive]

Kemp is winning 77% of the election day vote so far according to the GA SOS's website.

[ON Progressive]

https://twitter.com/DecisionDeskHQ/status/1021905496339505154

This is incredibly sad.

[ON Progressive]

Another first round leader who is seriously underperforming: David Shafer in the LG race.

Normally people who get 49% of the vote in the first round of a primary easily win in the second round, but he's trailing by 644 votes right now. It'll only get worse because he's down 9400 votes in the election day totals.

[ON Progressive]

If anyone can reach out to the rurals, it would be her. Still think Kemp has this, but Abrams will give it all she got. I see this more of a toss-up than the Ohio/Wisconsin races (which are clearly Likely R, if not Solid R, right now). Rooting big for Abrams to turn the tide and end the GOP hegemony here.

In what universe are Ohio and Wisconsin likely/solid R?  You just aren't speaking sense.

Keep in mind that this is coming from the guy who thought Trump would get a "cave bump" from the rescue of the students in Thailand.

One of the looniest instances of Atlas crankery since pbrower outlined his "air hub theory" of presidential nominations.

Wait the what theory?

This gem: https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=104956.msg2227105#msg2227105

[ON Progressive]

Does anyone remember what times GA was called for Deal and Trump?

I can't say I know for Deal, but Trump was projected at 11:44 PM according to this: https://uselectionatlas.org/INFORMATION/ARTICLES/ElectionNight2016/pe2016elecnighttime.php