Votes are being counted in Tuesday's metro Atlanta race in which Democrat Jon Ossoff sought to parlay opposition to President Donald Trump into a victory that would rebuke the White House and embolden Democrats ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.
Tuesday night, Trump wrote: "Despite outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big "R" win with runoff in Georgia".
The trends point increasingly toward a June 20 runoff that would pit Ossoff against the top Republican vote-getter.
Ossoff, who finished with about 48%, will now head to a runoff on June 20 against Republican Karen Handel, the former Georgia Secretary of State, who bested 10 other GOP hopefuls with about 20% of the overall vote in the unusual all-party primary.
Democrats pulled out all the stops to put Ossoff over the 50-percent threshold to avoid a runoff, spending almost $9 million in outside money and bringing in celebrities like Samuel L. Jackson and Alyssa Milano to get out the vote. The question for Ossoff, and Democrats more broadly, is whether they can successfully link an establishment Republican like Handel to the less-than-popular Trump over the course of a two month, one-versus-one runoff slog.
Democrat Jon Ossoff came within a hair's breadth of dealing a major blow to President Trump Tuesday night, leading a crowded field of nearly a dozen Republicans but falling just short of winning a Georgia Congressional seat outight.
Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races. They saw his campaign, as well as a special House election last week in Kansas where a Democrat narrowly lost, as symbolic battlegrounds for their recovering party. Trump tweeted on Tuesday afternoon, just hours before polls close. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump's polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.
Despite Ossoff's big lead, Trump claimed victory and said he was "glad to be of help" in blocking the Democrat from winning outright. "These liberal Democrats failed to inspire voters with a candidate who. received 97 percent of his donations from outside the district, and consistently lied about his own weak resume".
Trump's activity was unsurprising in a race that many nationally tried to paint as a referendum on the president in a congressional district where he lagged far behind other Republicans in 2016.
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Special elections are screwy barometers of the national mood, which is unfortunate because their isolation makes it much more likely they'll be interpreted as such.
"Jon Ossoff's first-place finish tonight is a huge triumph for the Resistance and for progressives, who boosted Ossoff to the top of a crowded race in a Republican-leaning district".
Ossoff grew up in Georgia's Sixth District, born to a Jewish father and Australian mother. Hill resigned to run in the special election for the 6th Congressional District.
Handel's efforts as secretary of state to purge Georgia's voter rolls by requiring voters to prove their citizenship led to fights with the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. Ossoff, who has worked as a congressional aide before turning to journalism, recently told The Guardian that he was "laser-focused on local economic issues". Party officials say they can beat Ossoff once the primary is over and they unite behind a single candidate.
Trump blasted Ossoff on Twitter and said in a robocall that the Democrat would "raise your taxes, destroy your healthcare, and flood our country with illegal immigrants".
Despite Trump's Twitter barrage, the White House insisted the race isn't about the president.
While Handel kept her distance from Trump, Ossoff launched his bid with an email solicitation inviting liberals to "Make Trump Furious".
"Ossoff will finally have an opponent to set up a clear and beneficial contrast".
The Republican National Committee praised Handel's performance, with Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel congratulating her "for emerging from a large and qualified Republican field".
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