Former President Obama will campaign with Sen. Raphael Warnock (D) on Dec. 1, ahead of Georgia’s runoff election the following week, a source familiar with the planning said.
The visit will be Obama’s second to the state in recent weeks to show support for Warnock against Republican Herschel Walker. If Warnock wins in the Dec. 6 runoff, it will give an added boost to Democrats in the Senate, raising their majority to 51 seats.
Democrats already will control the upper chamber; they now control 50 seats and also have Vice President Harris’s tie-breaking vote. But another seat would allow them to more seamlessly confirm federal judges and also control which bills can come to the Senate floor.
Obama — one of the Democratic Party’s most popular and sought-after surrogates — visited the state ahead of the general election, appearing before a crowd of more than 7,000 people and putting an emphasis on saving democracy.
“Democracy is not self-executing,” the former president said. “It depends on us working, nurturing, caring for it, not just on Election Day, but every day in between. It depends on us as citizens saying, ‘This matters!’ This election matters, Georgia.”