| | | | |  | | By Brakkton Booker | With help from Brittany Gibson, Jesús Rodríguez, Ella Creamer and Teresa Wiltz
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Poll workers help to check a voter in at a polling location in Atlanta on Tuesday, Dec. 6. | POLITICO illustration/Getty Images | What up, Recast family! The Supreme Court signals it is sympathetic to an evangelical web designer who refused to build wedding websites for same-sex couples, ex-President Donald Trump suggests the Constitution can be ignored and a battle brews over vaccine mandates for the U.S. military. We kick things off with the epicenter of the political universe: Georgia's Senate runoff. The nation, once again, is waiting for Georgians to decide the final outcome of a pivotal and contentious election cycle. Incumbent Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, a Baptist minister who toppled a sitting Republican in 2021, is trying to avoid that same fate against his current GOP challenger Herschel Walker, a former football standout who was hand-picked by former President Donald Trump to run. Sure, the Georgia runoff lost some of its gravity after Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto was declared the winner four days after the midterms, successfully defending her Nevada seat and stripping away the make-or-break stakes for control of the Senate. This runoff, though, offers a litmus test for how receptive voters in this increasingly diverse state are to the divergent messages offered by these two Black men. Walker has been lampooned by the left for his numerous stumbles and fumbles on the campaign trail, most recently during the cold-open on "Saturday Night Live ." There, Atlanta-born actor Kenan Thompson leaned into the caricature of Walker as a bumbling candidate propped up by the GOP. |  | The Republican nominee has made headlines for incoherent anecdotes about vampires and werewolves , conflicting views on the right to an abortion and allegations that he paid for a former girlfiend to terminate her pregnancy while running as a staunch anti-abortion rights candidate. Then there's his perhaps tongue-in-cheek admission that he doesn't know what pronouns are during a stump speech on Monday. In a Monday appearance on MSNBC , Warnock was asked by host Joy-Ann Reid about "the dignity, not just of the Senate, not just of the state of Georgia, but of Black men, to be blunt" and whether Warnock thought Walker was being used as a "tool" by the GOP. Warnock did not take the bait and dodged the question. But he gave an answer he's often repeated, drilling down on his opponent's fitness for the position. "We know that he is unprepared. We know he's unqualified," Warnock responded. "And it gives me no pleasure to say this, but, as a preacher, I'm in the business of truth-telling. He's unfit to represent the people of Georgia in the United States Senate."
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Sen. Raphael Warnock waves to supporters as arrives to speak at a campaign rally Monday at Georgia Tech in Atlanta. | John Bazemore/AP Photo | If the majority of Georgians felt that way, we wouldn't be here, though. Since neither Warnock nor Walker got more than the 50 percent threshold needed to win the contest outright, the answer to who will become the 100th U.S. senator in the next Congress remains an open question. Still, Walker's candidacy has been complicated. He's got broad name recognition as a native son: He brought a national championship to the University of Georgia in 1980 and won the Heisman Trophy in 1982. He also bills himself as a successful businessman, but has been dogged by allegations of exaggerated business claims and lawsuits . Then there was a report last month from CNN that he is getting a tax break on a Texas home he's using as a primary residence.
|  CBS News/Twitter | Perhaps that's why Georgia's Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, a Republican, denounced Walker in an interview with CBS News last week : "I think Herschel Walker will probably go down as one of the worst Republican candidates in our party's history." But Walker has proven — despite all of the perceived flaws — to be a formidable candidate. His closing message is one that leans into the culture wars energizing voters on the right. "If you want a change, if you want better gas prices, if you want better grocery prices, if you want this border secured, if you want men out of women's sports, if you want all these things that people have [sic] died and gave us a right for the freedoms [of] the United States of America, you got to vote and get involved," Walker said in a weekend interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business.
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Herschel Walker greets supporters during a last-day campaign stop at the Governors Gun Club in Kennesaw, Ga., on Dec. 5, 2022. | Ben Gray/AP Photo | The early voting period of the runoff has set records, with more than 1 million ballots cast, according to the Georgia secretary of state's office . As my POLITICO colleagues Jessica Piper and Madison Fernandez point out, data from those figures suggests high turnout among Black voters , who broke overwhelmingly for Warnock in the general election, according to one exit poll . But just how motivated conservatives across Georgia will be to vote is the last unanswered question of this cycle. If they show up, there's a strong chance Walker scores on the final drive of the midterm season. As always, we'll be watching. All the best,
The Recast Team
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| | | RUNOFF BRINGS OUT BIG-NAME SURROGATES
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Former President Barack Obama, left, greets Sen. Raphael Warnock before Obama speaks during a rally on Thursday, Dec. 1 in Atlanta. | Brynn Anderson/AP Photo | In any tight contest, the candidates' closing message is key to energizing voters to come out to the polls. POLITICO's Brittany Gibson spent the final days crisscrossing the Peach State trailing both Walker and Warnock as each made their final pitches to voters and sent this dispatch. Amid his nonstop campaign schedule, Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock (and his bald head) scored an invitation to The Swag Shop, an Atlanta barbershop owned by rapper and political organizer Killer Mike. Just blocks from the King Center and Ebenezer Baptist Church where Martin Luther King Jr . served as co-pastor and Warnock currently is senior pastor, Killer Mike talked about the organizing background he shares with Warnock, an approach inspired by leaders in the original civil rights movement, such as former Ambassador Andrew Young. Killer Mike, half of the rap duo Run The Jewels, is a notoriously hard to please political organizer. He was previously active on the Bernie Sanders presidential campaigns and critical of many Georgia politicians in the years since. He rarely lends out his star power to politicians. But Warnock won his approval. "I think that the people that frequent my shops are in large part Black men and the mothers and sisters bringing young Black men here [and they] deserve a space that's safe for them to talk about issues and for politicians to meet them right where they are. And what better place than a barbershop?" Killer Mike told POLITICO in an exclusive interview.
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At the event, Warnock spoke about the importance of exercising the right to vote as a way to use your voice — a message he shares at every campaign stop, and one that seemed particularly pertinent the day before the runoff.
For his part, Walker made one of his final campaign stops at a gun range in Cobb County , where he tossed T-shirts to gleeful supporters as "Don't Stop Believin'" by the group Journey blared from loud speakers. When I asked Walker why he was noticeably absent from the campaign trail following the Thanksgiving holiday, he defended his campaign strategy. "I've been talking to as many [voters] as I can. ... I've never been hiding," Walker said .
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Georgia Republican senate candidate Herschel Walker, second from left, poses with his wife Julie Blanchard, Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) and former executive director of the Christian Coalition Ralph Reed during a campaign rally Sunday, Dec. 4 in Loganville, Ga. | Alex Wong/Getty Images | At a separate event, Walker held a lightly-attended meet and greet at his alma mater, the University of Georgia, while his former football team geared up to play in the SEC championship outside the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. Walker was joined on the trail by Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham and Tim Scott of South Carolina and John Kennedy of Louisiana. But most in-state surrogates remained at a distance in the closing days of the campaign.
| | | ICYMI @ POLITICO
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Demonstrators are pictured outside the Supreme Court before justices heard oral arguments on 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, Monday, Dec. 5 in Washington. | Francis Chung/POLITICO | Colorful questions at SCOTUS — POLITICO's Josh Gerstein breaks down the legal arguments from a case where a Colorado web designer is fighting her state's laws outlawing discrimination against same-sex couples. Oddly, dating websites including JDate, AshleyMadison.com and questions about Black Santas and children in KKK outfits were brought up. A Challenge to Ronna McDaniel? — POLITICO's Alex Isenstadt reports on the potential insurgent challenge for the RNC chair . Meet Harmeet Dhillon, an RNC committeewoman and staunch supporter of Donald Trump, thought to be readying a bid. Is New York in the House? — POLITICO's Marianne LeVine and Sarah Ferris weigh in on the budding chemistry between the Democratic leaders from New York: Sen. Chuck Schumer, the nation's first Jewish majority leader and incoming House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, who will become the first Black American to lead a major party in either chamber of Congress next year.
| | | THE RECAST RECOMMENDS Will Smith is the star of the Civil War-era drama " Emancipation ," in which he plays an enslaved man who escapes from a plantation. It's out in select theaters now, but it'll be streaming on AppleTV+ starting Dec. 9. Escape with Salman Rushdie's magical new work, " A Sackful of Seeds ," in the New Yorker this week. It's an extract of his forthcoming saga "Victory City." Japan Society is putting on virtual and in-person showings of four coming-of-age films by '90s star director Shunji Iwai, who delicately captured the struggles of growing up .
|  | Don't miss the People's Choice Awards tonight at 9 p.m. on NBC. Kenan Thompson is hosting, and Lizzo is set to receive the People's Champion Award. Stromae's NPR Tiny Desk concert weaves a tapestry of pain and joy through sound.
|  | " The Far Country ," showing at the Linda Gross Theater in Manhattan, explores immigrant experiences in the wake of the Chinese Exclusion Act. For the nostalgic ones among us: Keke Palmer and Angela Bassett catch up 16 years after starring together in "Akeelah and the Bee." A$AP Rocky sends a message to the music industry in a video for a new track .
|  | TikTok of the Day: Wholesome
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