Decatur, Ga.- With just two days remaining in the early voting period candidates up and down the ballot are doing some housekeeping before Election Day, Tuesday, November 8. Rallies in supportive cities and communities are just as much for the candidates as they are for the voters. As of Thursday morning more than 1.8 million Georgians have voted early in-person with another 193,978 absentee ballots having been cast, according to the Secretary of State’s Office. The two-million vote mark is a state record for a midterm election.
Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock (D-GA), who according to a number of polls is ahead in a close race with challenger Herschel Walker, was in Decatur Thursday night for a campaign stop. During the 25-minute rally, Senator Jon Ossoff (D-GA) and Bee Nguyen, who is running for Secretary of State against incumbent Brad Raffensperger, were also in attendance to support Warnock. “I’m here with a very simple message, say it with me, say vote, vote, vote,” said Ossoff, who admitted he had been on the campaign trail with Warnock “all day.”
Nguyen said this election “is about those who came before us.” She called voting an act of faith. “It says we believe there are better days in Georgia.”
Warnock was his usual self, joking with the crowd about calling friends and family that owe them money and making sure that they voted early. “I know that many of you have already voted, I need you to make sure other folks have voted,” he said.
The mood turned a bit more serious when Warnock spoke about what he believes is at stake during these elections. “These are serious times and you need a serious person to represent you,” he said to a crowd of a couple dozen people inside the Porter Sanford III Performing Arts Community Center. “The good news is in my race there’s only one clear choice.”
Another woman being represented by celebrity attorney Gloria Allred revealed that she too had been made to have an abortion by Walker. Warnock said the difference between him and Walker is a character issue. “I will continue to make that case over the next few days,” said Warnock.
Asked why Walker doesn’t have a second debate in order to correct the record on the violence against women and the abortion allegations? The two men debated in Savannah three weeks ago for the first and only time. Warnock said, “There’s nothing stopping him from standing in front of a microphone and answering these questions. It’s a good question. Why won’t he answer these questions, why is he just dismissing these women. Multiple women.”
“The people of Georgia deserve to know what kind of man, what kind of person this is. I think it’s telling that he won’t answer the questions,” Warnock said.
One of the voters Warnock was speaking of may be 85-year-old Beatrice Williams, who was at the event because of what her parents had to go through in order to vote many years ago. “My mother and father fought so hard to be able to vote,” said Williams, who has three great grandchildren and wore red, white and blue American flag designs on her nails. “So it’s in my blood. I don’t want us to lose our democracy.”
Walker is scheduled to campaign in LaGrange Friday morning. Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (R-HI) and former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi will join him, according to a media advisory from the Walker campaign.