Democrats take control of the Senate

By Melissa Macaya, Meg Wagner, Veronica Rocha and Mike Hayes, CNN

Updated 2312 GMT (0712 HKT) January 6, 2021
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2:18 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

CNN Projection: Democrat Warnock defeats GOP Sen. Loeffler

From CNN's Marshall Cohen and Alex Rogers

Senate candidate Raphael Warnock of Georgia speaks to supporters during a rally on November 15 in Marietta, Georgia.
Senate candidate Raphael Warnock of Georgia speaks to supporters during a rally on November 15 in Marietta, Georgia. Jessica McGowan/Getty Images

Democratic Senate candidate Rev. Raphael Warnock will defeat GOP candidate Kelly Loeffler, CNN projects.

Warnock, the senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, will make history as the first Black US senator from Georgia.

In an address earlier Wednesday, Warnock spoke to his supporters and thanked them.

"To everyone out there struggling today, whether you voted for me or not, know this," Warnock said. "I hear you, I see you and every day I'm in the United States Senate I will fight for you."

Warnock is the first Georgia Democrat elected to the Senate in 20 years, and his election is the culmination of years of voter registration drives conducted by former state House Democratic leader Stacey Abrams and other activists.

President-elect Joe Biden also won Georgia, the first time for a Democratic presidential candidate since the 1990s.

Some context: The party that wins the race between GOP candidate David Perdue and Democrat Jon Ossoff will take control of the Senate.

CNN's Chris Cuomo and John Berman have more:

1:56 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Fulton County will resume counting votes in the morning

From CNN's Drew Griffin

Workers scan ballots and check for discrepancies at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, Georgia on January 5 during the Georgia Senate runoff elections.
Workers scan ballots and check for discrepancies at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, Georgia on January 5 during the Georgia Senate runoff elections. Sandy Huffaker/AFP/Getty Images

Election workers in Fulton County will be wrapping up and will resume counting the remaining absentee ballots at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday morning, according to an announcement made inside the vote-counting center.

As previously reported, 4,000 absentee ballots have yet to be tabulated.

1:52 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

DeKalb County will manually scan remaining 19,000 ballots

From CNN's Nick Valencia

DeKalb County, in suburban Atlanta, began experiencing vote count delays early Wednesday morning due to some kind of technical issue at the election office.

Due to these issues, an election official says the 19,000 remaining ballots will be "manually scanned to be tabulated and added to the total vote count."

“Georgia’s voting system provides built-in-safeguards, in the form of paper ballots, that allow us to quickly process ballots that are electronically cast. These outstanding paper ballots are currently being scanned and the tabulation will be completed as quickly as possible and in compliance with State guidelines," Erica Hamilton, director of voter registration and elections, said in a statement.

 The county is a Democratic stronghold.

1:51 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Ossoff campaign: "We look forward to seeing the process through"

From CNN's Caroline Kenny

Democratic Senate candidate Jon Ossoff’s campaign has released a statement expressing confidence in winning the runoff election when "all the votes are counted."

“When all the votes are counted we fully expect that Jon Ossoff will have won this election to represent Georgia in the United States Senate," the statement said.

“We look forward to seeing the process through in the coming hours and moving ahead so Jon can start fighting for all Georgians in the U.S. Senate,” the statement continues.

CNN has not made a projection in the race. Ossoff is currently neck-and-neck with Republican rival David Perdue.

1:47 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Technical issue causing delay in DeKalb County vote count

From CNN's Nick Valencia

DeKalb County, in suburban Atlanta, began experiencing vote count delays early Wednesday morning due to some kind of technical issue at the election office.

County CEO Michael Thurmond told CNN the county is working to fix the delay and expects to release more details soon.

“We’re working on getting you out a statement shortly,” he said.

The county currently has about 19,000 outstanding in-person early votes yet to be reported.

CNN's Nick Valencia has more:

1:47 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Warnock projects confidence in remarks to supporters as he takes lead over Loeffler

From CNN's Leinz Vales

Democratic Senate candidate Rev. Raphael Warnock.
Democratic Senate candidate Rev. Raphael Warnock. Source: Warnock Campaign

In a speech to supporters, Democratic Senate candidate Rev. Raphael Warnock projected confidence that he would win his race against GOP candidate Kelly Loeffler, by saying he's "going to the Senate to work for all of Georgia."

"To everyone out there struggling today, whether you voted for me or not, know this," Warnock said. "I hear you, I see you and every day I'm in the United States Senate I will fight for you."

CNN has yet to call his Georgia Senate race. Warnock currently is ahead of Loeffler by more than 35,649 votes.

Warnock recalled his family history as an example of how historic his candidacy is for the nation. If he were to win the election, he would become the first Black senator from Georgia.

"As a son of Georgia, my roots are planted deeply in Georgia soil," Warnock said. "A son of my late father who was a pastor, a veteran, and a small business man. And my mother who as a teenager growing up in Waycross, Georgia, used to pick somebody's else's cotton. But the other day because this is America, 82-year-old hands that used to pick somebody else's cotton went to the polls and picked her youngest son to be a United States senator."

Watch the moment:

1:50 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Loeffler to supporters: "We have a path to victory and we're staying on it"

From CNN's Keith Allen

Republican Senate candidate Kelly Loeffler.
Republican Senate candidate Kelly Loeffler. Source: WGCL

Republican Senate candidate Kelly Loeffler spoke briefly to supporters after midnight in Atlanta, neither conceding nor claiming victory in the Georgia Senate runoff election.

“It’s gonna be another late night, there are a lot of votes out there as you all know, and we have a path to victory and we're staying on it,” Loeffler told the crowd.

“This is a game of inches, we're gonna win this election," she added.

“It's worth it for this election to last into tomorrow, we're going to make sure every vote is counted,” Loeffler said. “Every legal vote will be counted.”

Loeffler thanked her supporters, reiterated her support for President Trump, and said she will be in Washington, DC, tomorrow for the count of the Electoral College votes in Congress.

“In the morning in fact I'm going to be heading to Washington, DC, to fight,” Loeffler said. “We're gonna fight for this President, so I'm asking for every single Georgian, every single American stay in the fight with us.”

Watch the moment:

12:32 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Votes are still coming in from largely Democratic counties, Georgia election official says

From CNN's Caroline Kenny

Gabriel Sterling, the voting systems implementation manager, just delivered what he said would be the final briefing from the Georgia secretary of state’s office for the night.

Sterling said overall, it looks like they have about 27,600 or so advance votes to come in. About 19,000 will come in from DeKalb County and about 7,000 from Coffee County. He added that there will be a hodgepodge of other votes in other locations. 

There is a small list of incomplete counties: Appling, Bibb, Camden, Cobb, Coffee, DeKalb, Douglas, Floyd, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry, Houston, Lumpkin, Newton and Pickens.

Sterling said there were 1,244,374 votes cast on Election Day, which is more than they anticipated.

He also said the secretary of state's office asked counties to please finish processing absentee ballots that were received on Election Day by lunchtime Wednesday.

On Chatham County, Sterling said they did not just stop counting for the night, and he explained they have counted everything they have.

Chatham has a unique system — they have both a Board of Elections and a Board of Registrations. The Board of Registration gets the ballots in, accepts them, then hands them to Board of Elections to count them. Out of abundance of looking out for employees, they will allow the registration group to finish their work tonight, then hands over in the morning for the Board of Elections to finish. What's left is the absentee ballots that came in today via mail and drop box. 

“In terms of the amount of votes that are potentially out there are coming from largely Democratic counties, there are some Republican counties – Floyd, Forsyth, Appling – but they are smaller in comparison to DeKalb's, Gwinnett's, Cobb's and Fulton's,” Sterling said. “That tells you that the outstanding will likely be leaning Democrat at best.”

Sterling said he believes there will be a midmorning update Wednesday.

12:27 a.m. ET, January 6, 2021

Faint hopes growing dim, GOP sources say

From CNN's Ryan Nobles

As CNN reported earlier, Republicans were very concerned about the release of votes in the Democratic stronghold of DeKalb County.

Once those results came in and dramatically swung the race in favor of Democratic candidate Raphael Warnock and also narrowed the gap for Democrat Jon Ossoff, GOP operatives conceded that their path to victory was narrow and starting to vanish.

One Georgia Republican said he believed the outstanding vote was too heavily tilted in favor of the Democrats for either Republican to be able to win.

Another Washington Republican operative said the best hope at this point for the GOP is that Perdue can keep the margin close enough that would allow for a recount, but even that seemed unlikely.