AP Photo/David Goldman
- During the Georgia Senate race, Raphael Warnock didn't stray from his deep roots in the church.
- Warnock effectively engaged with a wide range of voters in a state that can be tough for Democrats.
- His election night speech showcased how his message was able to appeal to different constituencies.
As newly-reelected Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia on Tuesday stepped onstage at his election night party in Atlanta, the event had the feeling of a joyous revival — filled with supporters who were basking in the victory of a deft lawmaker who also happens to be a man of the cloth.
Words matter in politics, but when Warnock speaks, people often listen intently, as the senator — the senior pastor of Atlanta's historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, where the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was once co-pastor — knows how to bring in a crowd.
"I often say that a vote is a kind of prayer for the world we desire for ourselves and for our children," he said during his address. "Voting is faith put into action and Georgia, you have been praying with your lips and your legs, with your hands and your feet, your heads and your hearts. You have put in the hard work, and here we are standing together."
Warnock defeated former University of Georgia football legend Herschel Walker to secure a full six-year term in the Senate. This, after he handily won the Democratic primary this past May and narrowly led his Republican opponent 49.4%-48.5% in the November general election — falling just short of the 50% threshold needed for an outright victory — before going on to win the runoff election.
"You voted and you did it because you believe as I do that democracy is the political enactment of a spiritual idea, this notion that each of us has within us a spark of the Divine, that we were created in the image of God," the senator said on Tuesday night. "And if you're not given to that kind of religious language, that's fine. Our tent is big."
"Simply put it this way: each of us has value," Warnock went on to say, "and if we have value, we ought to have a voice."
While Warnock's position at Ebenezer — where he has occupied the pulpit since 2005 — and his elected position are fully separate, his vernacular has allowed him to connect with a wide spectrum of Georgians, giving him unique inroads with voters in a way that has propelled him to political stardom.
AP Photo/Ben Gray
'This is a moral moment'
When Warnock delivered his maiden speech on the Senate floor in March 2021, he wasn't just conveying ideas to his colleagues — he was helping spark a national conversation on elections in the United States.
Just weeks after becoming Georgia's first Black senator, on the heels of his first whirlwind runoff election, Democratic leaders looked to Warnock to help make a clear case for passage of the voting-rights legislation.
As the senator spoke of the merits of the For the People Act, which would have expanded early voting and made Election Day a holiday, among other reforms, while also pushing for the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would have restored key provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, he recounted a story about his late father, Jonathan Warnock.
"I had an older father. He was born in 1917. Serving in the Army during World War II, he was once asked to give up his seat to a young teenager while wearing his soldier's uniform, but he was never bitter. By the time I came along, he had already seen the arc of change in our country. He maintained his faith in God, in his family and in the American promise, and he passed that faith on to his children," Warnock said at the time.
Shortly before a combined voting-rights bill succumbed to a GOP-led filibuster in the evenly-split Senate this past January, Warnock issued a firm message to his colleagues before the vote was held.
"We have been summoned here by history," he said on the Senate floor. "This is not just another routine day in the Senate. This is a moral moment in America."
It was almost as if Warnock was in the pulpit at Ebenezer, speaking to parishioners about looking out for their fellow citizens. It could have been Warnock on the campaign trail as he spoke about his legislative work in support of the roughly 640,000 military veterans in Georgia. Or it could also have been in late November when civil-rights icon and former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young helped lead a procession alongside Warnock for a "Souls to the Polls" push — which has become a tradition among many Black voters — to encourage Georgians to cast ballots in the runoff.
AP Photo/Bill Barrow
'A pro-choice pastor'
The issue of abortion, especially in a state with a large base of evangelical Christian voters, was something that both candidates were bound to approach from different perspectives.
Warnock was critical of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade and described himself as "a pro-choice pastor," presenting a clear contrast to Walker's antiabortion stance.
When Walker was accused by two women of having paid for abortions in the past, the Republican vehemently rejected the allegations. During the campaign, Walker supported a 15-week abortion ban and indicated that he would have backed a bill at the federal level that was proposed by Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, despite the then-GOP candidate stating that he believed the issue was best left at the state level.
In a September poll conducted by the University of Georgia School of Policy and International Affairs for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 48% of respondents indicated that they were more likely to back a candidate who would protect abortion rights, while 25% said they would be less inclined to back a candidate who supported abortion rights and 23% said a candidate's position on the issue wasn't a factor in their vote.
Walker, leaning into his appeal with many rural evangelical conservatives, often spoke about his anti-abortion stance and sought to put Warnock on the spot during the pair's televised debate in October, questioning the senator over the issue of life.
But Warnock spoke of the need to keep government from interfering in the reproductive health decisions of women, while also remarking on his work in the Senate to combat maternal mortality rates.
In the state's most conservative bastions, Walker racked up large GOP margins on Tuesday despite his controversies, but in metropolitan Atlanta — where Warnock performed exceptionally well in the general election and the runoff — the senator's pro-choice views appealed to many moderates and also some disaffected Republicans who may have backed some form of abortion rights.
However, even in rural communities — especially those heavily populated by Black residents — Warnock showed up and emphasized a broad range of bipartisan initiatives that he had focused on in the Senate, which chipped away at Walker's margins in many areas compared to the general election. And the senator, who is well-versed in the Bible, knew how to speak with voters from different walks of life, while not forgoing his roots in the Black church.
Andra Gillespie, an associate professor of political science at Emory University, told Insider that Georgia's political environment was reflected in the way that the candidates communicated with voters.
"Georgia's political culture is not as liberal as in other parts of the country. There are going to be more people who go to church and you want to respect that," she said. "You've heard all of candidates make references to God in ways that you might not hear if they were running in Oregon or if they were running in Massachusetts."
AP Photo/John Bazemore
'The light shines in the darkness'
During his victory speech, Warnock in many ways still sounded like the candidate who could speak about infrastructure issues or health care reform with the same zeal whether you lived in rural Georgia or resided in Atlanta.
With a heavy dose of enthusiasm, Warnock energized a diverse array of voters who helped power him to two runoff victories in the past two years, turning what used to be a state where Democrats continually faltered into one where they are competitive.
And he acknowledged that while many Americans have faced challenges in recent years, retaining a sense of faith was important.
"I know that the days are still difficult, times are dark, but the light shines in the darkness and the darkness overcometh it not," he said.
"God bless you. Keep the faith, and keep looking up!" he concluded, leaving the crowd with parting words that didn't disappoint in uplifting their spirits.
from Business Insider https://ift.tt/xCIAHqB
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