Walker, Warnock In Dead Heat For Senate As Kemp Opens Lead In Governor’s Race

Topline

Voters in Georgia are evenly split between incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock (D) and former football star Herschel Walker (R) in what’s shaping up to be one of the most competitive midterm Senate races, according to a new poll, which suggests Republicans are otherwise in solid shape in the Southern swing state.

Key Facts

Walker and Warnock are knotted at 46% support in their Senate race, according to a poll from East Carolina University, with only 6% of voters undecided.

It’s better news for Republicans in the governor’s race, where incumbent Gov. Brian Kemp (R) leads Democrat Stacey Abrams 50%-45% in a rematch of the 2018 contest, which Kemp won by only 1.2 percentage points.

Support for former President Donald Trump is even stronger—47% of respondents said they’d vote for Trump in a potential rematch with President Joe Biden, who polled at just 40%.

The poll found a significant divide between the preferences of white and Black voters—some 83% of Black respondents backed Warnock, while 65% of white voters supported Walker; in the governor’s race, 86% of Black voters said they’re planning to vote for Abrams, but 70% of white respondents supported Kemp.

The ECU poll of 868 registered voters is the first major survey of Georgia since the state’s primaries last month.

Contra

Georgia’s Republican voters bucked most of Trump’s choices for statewide office in last month’s primaries, notably propelling Kemp to a nearly 52-point win over Trump-endorsed former Sen. David Perdue in the GOP gubernatorial primary.

Key Background

Republicans are eyeing the Georgia Senate race as one of the best chances to knock off an incumbent Democrat, as the party hopes to win back Congress by capitalizing on Biden’s poor approval ratings. Democrats, meanwhile, have long had their sights on getting Abrams into the governor’s mansion. Her national profile has risen significantly since she narrowly lost the 2018 contest, while Georgia’s status as a solidly red state collapsed when Biden beat Trump there in the 2020 presidential election and Democrats captured both of the state’s Senate seats in January 2021 runoffs.

Tangent

Warnock’s Senate seat is one of five the Cook Political Report considers toss-ups in the midterms. Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) are all in toss-up races, while the open seat left by retiring Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) is also listed as a toss-up. Republicans need a net gain of just one seat to take the majority in the Senate.

Further Reading

Trump’s Picks Get Clobbered In Georgia Primaries—But He Still Claims ‘Success’ (Forbes)

Biden Has Seen Biggest Drop In Approval Among Young Voters Since Taking Office, Poll Finds (Forbes)