Georgia Senate Thread – Final Update

Georgia’s Senate seats are in play, with plenty at stake. Polls have drifted slowly to favor both Democrats, but the state has tended toward Republican Senators over the last two decades. The Republicans have dealt with an effort from the Trumpists to call for a boycott, which would have tanked their chances of keeping the seats; that helped inspire both of them to push hard in favor of Trump’s conspiracy-fueled efforts to bypass the general election results.

Tonight, and possibly into tomorrow, we will see the results of their efforts. We’d likely have a definitive answer within a couple of hours, but Georgia is laboring under the restraints put in place by their state legislature which prevent votes from being counted until the polls close. The early votes are now being tallied, rather than having the results waiting. Still, despite all of the paranoid complaints and fears stoked from every angle, Georgia’s elections ran very smoothly in the general even in the face of a plumbing catastrophe. It is reasonable to assume a similarly professional handling this time.

Here are some channels which are covering the races, and an irregularly-updated tally of where the races stand.

Washington Post, results at the bottom of the screen with commentary:

Reuters, just the county maps updated as information comes in:

538 Live blog with analysis and results

And us:

97% of the vote tallied

GA Senate seat 1:

David Perdue (R) – 2,189,562

Jon Ossoff (D) – 2,188,354

GA Senate seat 2:

Kelly Loeffler (R) – 2,171,156

Raphael Warnock (D) – 2,206,858

As always, feel encouraged to chat about the election and all related issues, although things like cat pictures should really go into the open thread. And by all means, update everyone with info if it seems like it’s been far too long since a thread update, as I’ll probably only do it four or five times tonight.

UPDATE: It’s effectively over. There’s about 3% more to count, most of which are from heavily Democrat counties and/or via mail-in votes which have tended to strongly favor Democrats due to first COVID-19 concerns and then condemnation of the system by President Trump (and his enablers). With Loeffler already trailing by more than 35K votes, she’s not even going to have a remote chance of reaching the margin of error for a recount. With Perdue effectively tied, he’s going to lose but may have a chance to push for a worthless recount. Mitch McConnell will lost his spot as Senate Majority Leader as the Democrats take control of the split Senate by dint of having an aligned VP, and the Republicans will have gone from controlling the House, Senate and Presidency in 2016 to losing all three by 2020 due to Trump and Trumpism.