With the Jan. 5 runoff races now just a little more than a two weeks away, a final Survey USA Poll commissioned exclusively by 11Alive shows that Democratic candidates Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff are still holding onto their leads over Republican incumbents Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue. But, thanks to contributing factors like caustic rhetoric on the integrity of the election system, the races are still anyone's to win. According to the data, Ossoff has managed to widen his lead over Perdue since 11Alive's last poll on the Senate runoff, conducted a little over two weeks ago. Ossoff now leads Perdue 51% to 46% among those polled — up from his 50-to-48% lead. Meanwhile, in the other runoff race, Warnock's lead over Loeffler remains unchanged from two weeks ago; he still holds a 52-to-45% lead. Both polls are within the margin of error, though. At this moment, it appears both Democratic candidates may be benefiting from Republican infighting over who and what's to blame for President Trump's defeat in the Nov. 3 general election. Some in the GOP have laid blame at Republican leaders in Georgia and some extremist supporters of the president have suggested Republicans sit out the election. Some Republican voters may be listening. According to the survey results, roughly 5% of the 690 registered voters are sitting out the election. More of those voters are Republican, with some believing either "the voting process is rigged" or that "their vote doesn't matter." Overall, though, roughly 70% of voters say they have full or some confidence that the runoff election will be handled properly, and approve of the job the Secretary of State's office has done thus far. Meanwhile, with early voting under way in the Georgia Senate runoffs, almost 70,000 voters have newly registered in the state, according to TargetSmart voter data analyzed by NBC News. Experts and those in both parties generally agree that slight shifts in turnout will determine who wins these two races on Jan. 5, given how close the results were for the presidential and Senate contests in the general election. The NBC analysis found that 67,135 newly registered voters with no general election vote history were added to the list of potential voters for the upcoming runoffs. These voters were registered between Nov. 4 and the state registration deadline on Dec. 7. There are 7,729,838 total registered voters in Georgia. The big question, of course, is whether the Democrats or Republicans gain an edge with this group of new voters. The new registration numbers point to a slight advantage for the Democrats and, while this is encouraging for the party, the advantage is small, and slight shifts in turnout among those who participated in the general election could make such minor gains inconsequential. Overall, 52 percent majority of newly registered Georgia voters are men (34,638), compared with 48 percent (32,291) who are women. Young voters — a strong Democratic voting bloc — are likely to play a key role in the Georgia runoffs, either because they weren't eligible to vote in November but have since had birthdays making them able to vote in January, or because of pure enthusiasm. — Agencies
