The 2022 Georgia elections are finally over, and each political party has results to crow about. Republicans won a clean sweep of the statewide, state-level races, including a thumping re-election victory by Gov. Brian Kemp in his much-discussed rematch against notorious election denier Stacey Abrams. She lost so decisively this time that even she conceded the race. Republicans won nine of the state's 14 US House seats. The GOP maintained its grip on Georgia's legislature, holding the lower chamber 101-79, and the state Senate by a 33-23 margin. Democrats, however, won a marquee US Senate race, with incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock slightly leading Republican challenger Herschel Walker – who lagged far behind Kemp at the top of the ticket – on election day, then putting Walker away last night in a head-to-head runoff. Democrats have now won three consecutive Senate runoff elections in Georgia and maintain control over both of the state's seats.
Warnock's victory propels his party to a slightly improved 51-49 majority in the upper chamber, up from a 50-50 technical majority over the last two years. The loss of one net seat will make the GOP's task of winning back the Senate in 2024 just that much harder, although the map heavily favors them next cycle. The 2022 midterms conclude with zero incumbent senators having lost and just two major statewide offices changing hands (PA Senate, red to blue, and NV governor, blue to red). Everything else was status quo. In the Peach State, voter turnout broke records for a midterm election. As we documented in May, Georgia voters shattered previous turnout marks in the primaries, then blew away early voting records in the general election. Pre-Election Day turnout was so robust that the Secretary of State described it as "near Presidential-level numbers." In 2014, 2.54 million Georgians cast ballots in the gubernatorial race. In 2018, that number exploded to 3.94 million. Four years later, that number increased again, to 3.95 million. And ahead of yesterday's runoff, another early voting record was "smashed," in the words of an NBC News headline.
The point of all of this turnout cheering is that it utterly decimates a despicable lie advanced by Democrats – namely, that Georgia's sensible voting reforms passed by the legislature and signed by Gov. Kemp were tantamount to racist "Jim Crow" voter suppression. Stacey Abrams was the Democratic nominee in the highest-turnout gubernatorial elections in state history, back-to-back. She lost both of them, falling by roughly a point-and-a-half in 2018 in a race she said was stolen and refused to concede, then getting hammered by nearly eight points in 2022. The latter race came after the state's new electoral system was implemented. Turnout increased. And she lost by a much larger margin because the voters rejected her. She called the new law "Jim Crow 2.0," lying about it incessantly. Her reward for this racial deceit and divisiveness was a bruising loss at the polls, alongside a comprehensive slap-down in federal court. President Biden (who hails from and repeatedly won elections in an infamous voter "suppression" haven) described Georgia's law as worse than Jim Crow segregation – worse! – in the course of his disgusting demagoguery, which has been picked apart by fact-checkers. None of the Democrats who perpetrated this slander will ever admit fault or apologize. All of their political incentives are to keep making the claim to whip up anger, even if they are forced to mumble incoherently about how record-setting turnout is still a product of "suppression," or whatever.
Perhaps the bigger question is whether any of the corporations and major organizations that went along with the lie will admit fault and pledge not to stampede to join left-wing activists' lie-filled agitations in the future. Entities like Delta Airlines, Coca-Cola (which has somewhat backtracked), and especially Major League Baseball should be pressed on this point until they admit they overstepped and bought into a smear campaign that was not rooted in reality or truth. Last I checked, MLB is still headquartered in a state that still has more restrictive voting laws than Georgia – featuring nearly half of Georgia's early voting days, and where liberal voters soundly rejected an unnecessary expansion of what activists would label "voting rights" just last year. Why does MLB accept such "suppression"? Furthermore, Georgia – the state MLB shamefully punished by yanking the 2021 All-Star Game out of Atlanta – set new midterm election turnout records, blowing away all prior marks on early voting. The law ended up being popular among Georgia voters, it did the opposite of what mendacious critics claimed it would, and American consumers also gave low marks to companies delving into ignorant and performative wokery. If corporations and organizations want to wade into political battles, they should expect political blowback, especially when they take objectively false positions. MLB's Commissioner continues to react awkwardly when this pathetic episode is raised. I hope Mr. Manfred sees this, and is again forced to dwell uncomfortably on what he did, deliberately ignoring factual information:
When @MLB moved the All Star Game, it cost Atlanta $100M.
— Jason Snead (@jasonwsnead) December 5, 2022
But despite MLB lies, Georgia’s November election was a grand slam.
Here’s what the MLB is seeing today 👇 pic.twitter.com/3nb7CIzY2J
An indefensibly shameful campaign. You had the President of the United States and leading Democrats comparing a law that indisputably expanded voter access relative to pre-pandemic elections to Jim Crow and comparing supporters of that law to segregationists. https://t.co/1iOSC6R7yH
— AG (@AGHamilton29) December 6, 2022
More of this, please. Accountability is important:
Yesterday we at @honestelections ran a full-page print ad in the @ajc calling on @CocaCola to apologize for lying about Georgia’s election integrity law.
— Jason Snead (@jasonwsnead) December 5, 2022
After making it easier to vote and harder to cheat, Georgia just had one of its most successful elections in history. pic.twitter.com/fB5QRy5EFu
Delta Airlines richly deserves the same treatment.
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