Biden pulls ahead of Trump in Georgia, but the race isn't over

(Image credit: Jessica McGowan/Getty Images)

published 6 November 2020

Democrat Joe Biden pulled ahead of President Trump in Georgia at about 4:30 a.m. on Friday, when a tranche of votes from Clayton County shifted Biden from a small deficit to a lead of more than 1,000 votes. If Biden were to hold on to Georgia — news organizations are expected to refrain from projecting a winner for days or even weeks — he would be the first Democrat to win the state since Bill Clinton.

Officials in Clayton County, represented by the late Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), stayed up all night to count their ballots, even as other counties took a pause for the night. Most of the outstanding votes are expected to favor Biden, but there are also some uncounted provisional, military, and overseas ballots, and nobody is sure how those will land politically. Whichever candidate ends up behind when all the votes are counted is also presumed to ask for a recount. Nevertheless, Biden supporters — those still awake in the small hours of the morning — celebrated the moment and that it happened in Lewis territory.

Georgia would not push Biden to 270 electoral votes, based on most projections, but it does set up the increasingly vanishing possibility of a 269-269 tie. The latest votes also dropped Sen. David Perdue (R) another notch below 50 percent, and Democrat Jon Ossoff up a notch, making it more likely Georgia will have two Senate runoff elections Jan. 5, 2021.

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Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.