Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity congratulates member Raphael Warnock on victory in Georgia

Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., the country’s oldest intercollegiate African American Greek-letter fraternity, congratulated member and Sen.-elect Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) on his recent victory in the race against Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R) earlier this week. 

The nonprofit organization, which does not endorse political candidates, posted a congratulatory message to Warnock on Wednesday after multiple outlets called the runoff for the reverend, who will be the first Black senator from the Peach State. 

“Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. would like to congratulate Brother Reverend Dr. Raphael Warnock on his historic victory as the first African American U.S. Senator from the state of Georgia!” the fraternity wrote on Facebook.

According to the fraternity, Warnock was initiated into the organization’s Alpha Gamma Lambda Chapter in 1993 in New York. 

He had graduated from Morehouse College, an historically Black college or university (HBCU), in 1991, where he earned a bachelor of arts in psychology. He later attended Union Theological Seminary in New York, where he graduated with a masters in divinity, before going on to receive a Ph.D. and become an ordained minister. 

Warnock was the youngest person to serve as senior pastor at the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, where Martin Luther King Jr. had also been a pastor.

According to Watch The Yard, Warnock’s victory makes him the third member of his fraternity to secure a Senate seat.

He is one of a number of politicians with ties to historically Black institutions who have made headlines recently.

Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will not only be the first woman and first African American to hold the office; she will also be the first HBCU alum — Harris graduated from Howard University in 1986 — and the first person from an African American Greek-lettered sorority, specifically Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.

Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.), the first Black woman to win election to Congress in Missouri, also graduated from an HBCU, Harris-Stowe State University in St. Louis.

And Stacey Abrams, the former Georgia gubernatorial candidate who has drawn widespread praise for her voter mobilization efforts in Georgia in the wake of Democrats’ victories in the presidential and Senate races there, graduated from Spelman College.

Updated: 10:21 p.m.

Editor’s note: A previous version of this article misstated Warnock’s political party.