Runoff in Georgia could test Trump
Race is seen as an important test ahead of the 2018 midterm elections
DUNWOODY, Ga. — A narrow miss by a Democratic newcomer in a conservative Georgia House district has triggered a high-stakes runoff that could test President Donald Trump’s influence and the limits of the backlash against him.
Democrat Jon Ossoff, 30, a former congressional aide, came within 2 percentage points of an outright victory Tuesday over 17 other candidates in Georgia’s traditionally Republican 6th Congressional District.
The runoff victor will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. Price won 62 percent of the vote in November, about 14 percentage points ahead of Trump’s total.
Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, was a distant second, qualifying her for the runoff. Handel had treated Trump gingerly in a district the president barely carried, but she declared Wednesday that she’d like to see him campaign for her ahead of the June 20 runoff.
Handel told The Associated Press after taking a congratulatory call from Trump on Wednesday, “We are going to be united from this point going forward.”
Trump, who attacked Ossoff in recent days as a liberal shill, crowed on Twitter about the outcome in Georgia following Democrats’ failure to win a different special election in Kansas last week.
“Dems failed in Kansas and are now failing in Georgia. Great job Karen Handel! It is now Hollywood vs. Georgia on June 20th,” Trump wrote, alluding to celebrity donors to Ossoff.
Still, the close finishes in Georgia and Kansas underscored Democrats’ potential to capitalize on surging liberal energy after Trump’s election, even as they also pointed to the limits of how far Democrats can go in Republican-friendly districts.
The Kansas and Georgia races also serve notice that GOP candidates may struggle to handle Trump. In fact, Trump arguably gave Ossoff his opening in the first place; Trump barely won the district in November and failed to win a majority, four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.
Both major parties are approaching the runoff as an important test ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.