Georgia Senate runoff live updates: Warnock celebrates win, Walker admits defeat
The election was the final battle of the 2022 midterms.
Georgia's Senate runoff between Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock and Republican challenger Herschel Walker came to a close on Tuesday, with Warnock projected by ABC News to defeat Walker, after more than a year of campaigning, multiple controversies and record-breaking turnout.
While the race didn't determine control of the Senate, it did increase Democrats' power in the chamber -- where Vice President Kamala Harris currently has to break ties -- rather than see the Republicans win a 50th seat and create procedural obstacles.
Walker, a businessman and local football legend, and Warnock, a noted reverend in Atlanta, first faced off in November's general election. But neither got 50% of the vote as required by state law, leading to Tuesday's runoff after about a week of early voting.
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Scenes from Election Day in Georgia
Georgia voters turned out to the polls in record numbers on Tuesday to cast their ballots in the Senate runoff election between Warnock and Walker.
ABC News has projected that Warnock will win the runoff, making him Georgia’s first Black full-term senator. He has served in the seat since 2021, when he won a runoff against GOP incumbent Kelly Loeffler.
Photos showed supporters of both campaigns gathering to watch results come in.
Filmmaker Spike Lee rallied the crowd at an election night watch party for Warnock in Atlanta on Tuesday.
Voters shattered turnout records this runoff election. Despite rainy weather in parts of the state, some 1.4 million people cast a ballot on Tuesday, according to state officials.
How Warnock will make history again
Warnock is projected to make history yet again as the senator of Georgia.
In 2021, he became the first Black senator from Georgia after winning a runoff for a partial term.
With ABC News projecting him to win the Tuesday runoff against Walker, Warnock will become the first Black senator elected to a full six-year term in the state.
Either winner of the close race would have achieved that barrier-breaking feat.
Warnock became only the second Black senator elected from the South since the Reconstruction era, when he won last year's runoff against incumbent Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler.
Warnock projected to defeat Walker, expanding Democrats' Senate majority
Warnock has defeated Walker in Tuesday's runoff election in Georgia, ABC News projects.
Warnock's victory means Democrats will expand their majority in the chamber to 51 seats, compared to Republicans' 49.
The Georgia runoff was the final election of the 2022 midterms.
Biden says: 'We're going to win Georgia'
As he stepped off Air Force Once on Tuesday night, President Joe Biden was asked by a reporter to comment on the election in Georgia.
"We're going to win," he replied on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, after returning from a trip to Arizona.
"We're going to win Georgia."
He then boarded his vehicle to drive back into Washington.
-ABC News' Ben Gittleson
Warnock on his win: 'The people have spoken'
Warnock celebrated his projected victory on Tuesday night in Atlanta, walking out to a crowd chanting "six more years."
"After a hard-fought campaign -- or should I say campaigns? -- it is my honor to utter the four most powerful words ever spoken in a democracy: The people have spoken," Warnock said to cheers.
He thanked the crowd for their support, in particular his mother.
"She grew up in the 1950s in Waycross, Georgia, picking somebody else's cotton and somebody else's tobacco," he said. "But tonight she helped pick her youngest son to be a United States senator."
Warnock called himself a "proud son of Savannah" while discussing his deep roots in the state.
"I am Georgia," he said. "I am an example and an iteration of its history, of its pain and its promise, of the brutality and the possibility."
"But because this is America, because we always have a path to make this country greater against unspeakable odds, here we stand together," he continued.
Warnock said he plans to keep working for all Georgians, including in areas like lowering prescription costs, creating jobs across the state and addressing criminal justice reform.
"I'm ready to keep doing this work," he said in closing. "Let's build a stronger Georgia."