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Georgia voters head to the polls on Tuesday for the Senate runoff between Republican Herschel Walker and incumbent Democrat Raphael Warnock. For President Joe Biden, who already holds a narrow majority in the Senate, an additional seat would be more comfortable.
A pastor against a former American football star: the inhabitants of the State of Georgia are called on Tuesday, December 6 to decide between two candidates for the American Senate, in a vote with serious consequences for the continuation of Joe Biden’s mandate.
The outgoing senator, Democrat Raphael Warnock, is opposed to a colt of Donald Trump, the sportsman Herschel Walker. This is the last act of the mid-term legislative elections, a second round having been organized in this state to decide between the two candidates.
The ballot promises to be tight. The few polls show the candidates neck and neck and the final results may not be known for several days.
This election is “really essential”, argued US President Joe Biden on Monday, calling on Georgia voters to turn out in large numbers at the polls, which open at 7 a.m. local time. The balance of power in the US Congress certainly does not depend on this seat: the Democrats have already made sure to keep control of the Senate at the end of the “midterms”. The Republicans meanwhile took over the House.
But this election, in this southern state with a large African-American population, is nonetheless decisive for the rest of Joe Biden’s mandate. The Republicans see in this seat in the Senate the opportunity to accentuate their power to block the policies of the Democratic leader. With 700 days to go before the next presidential election, the opposition also hopes to break the momentum of Joe Biden, who did much better than expected in the November legislative elections.
$400 million
On the Democratic side, a victory would consolidate the very thin majority of Joe Biden’s party in the Senate, allowing him to exercise greater influence in essential parliamentary committees. It would also significantly limit the influence of a moderate Democratic senator, gravedigger of several major projects of the Biden administration.
To realize their ambitions, the Democrats have called on their heavyweights to the rescue: former President Barack Obama, undoubtedly one of the most charismatic figures in the party, was campaigning in Atlanta last week.
A sign of the importance and interest in this duel: nearly 400 million dollars were injected into the ballot, the most expensive of the mid-term elections.
Some 1.9 million people, out of the seven million registered, have already voted early. If these ballots point to greater Democratic mobilization, the Republicans should instead vote on Tuesday. It is therefore difficult to predict the outcome of this race.
With AFP
