An illustration depicts Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump on either side of the U.S. flag. With both presidential candidates campaigning hard in the state, Georgian voters ought to be excited about going to the ballot box. “No matter whether you’re a chicken farmer in Oglethorpe County, a grocery bagger in Downtown Atlanta or a Clarke Central High School senior, you have a tangible impact at the proverbial ballot box,” Editor-in-Chief Wyatt Meyer wrote. Illustration by Sylvia Robinson
In a newly competitive Georgia, voters should be excited about choosing their next Presidential candidate.
Your vote matters.
Wait, wait! Keep reading! Sure, it’s the cliche bandied about in seemingly every single political advertisement, poster and social media post for the past fifty years – it probably has about as much meaning as your phone’s Terms & Conditions.
Voters – especially Georgian voters – would be forgiven for passing the tired phrase by one more time.
But, alas, like most cliches, this one has merit.
Georgia, for the first time in decades, is now a true “purple” state – one not solidly voting Republican or Democrat – and that’s something to be proud of.
“(It’s) in the metro areas where most of the Democrats are, but I think in every county, even in rural counties like Oglethorpe County, (Democrats have) got about 30% of the vote,” Jane Kidd, the former Chair of the Georgia Democratic Party and current Chairman of the Oglethorpe County Democrats, said.”
Georgia is consistently being viewed by experts across the country as a true swing state – one that candidates appeal to, one in which every vote counts, one that could have a decisive impact on the election of America’s leader for the next four years.
Data shows that the race for Georgia’s 16 electoral votes is tight: as of Aug. 22, polls from The Washington Post and The New York Times show that Vice President Kamala Harris (D) and former President Donald Trump (R) are within four percentage points of each other in Georgia.
ABC News’ FiveThirtyEight, the organization with the most predictive forecasts of the past four Presidential and Senate elections, has the race for Georgia even closer. As of Aug. 22, the model shows that former President Trump leads by less than 1% in the state.
However, as most voters will remember, Georgia’s race hasn’t always been this close.
From the time Georgia was granted statehood in 1778 until 1964, Georgians didn’t vote for a Republican presidential candidate – making it the last state in the continental U.S. to do so. Since then, however, the state has only voted Democrat in four presidential elections, two of which were for Georgian native Jimmy Carter.
“We had not elected a Democratic president from the state since (former President Bill Clinton in 1992), so (Georgia) was written off one way or the other,” Kidd said. “It didn’t matter that the people they didn’t agree with were going to win anyway and do what they wanted to do anyway.”
If nothing else, that ought to underscore the rarity of this year’s elections. For the first time in years, Georgia is consistently being viewed by experts across the country as a true swing state
– one that candidates appeal to, one in which every vote counts, one that could have a decisive impact on the election of America’s leader for the next four years.
So, drink it in, Georgians – no longer are your votes one of the two P’s: perfunctory or protest. No matter whether you’re a chicken farmer in Oglethorpe County, a grocery bagger in Downtown Atlanta or a Clarke Central High School senior, you have a tangible impact at the proverbial ballot box.
So, when you decide whether to vote or not, believe what you can’t help but remember:
“Your vote counts.”
For real.
