As the votes roll in across Georgia, the margin is too close to call between Trump and Harris on election night. At time of publication, 93% of votes have been counted and former President Donald Trump maintains the lead with 50.8% of the popular vote against Vice President Kamala Harris with 48.5% of the popular vote.
The margin of votes between the candidates is around 118,489 votes currently, larger than the margin of 11,000 votes that President Joe Biden won by in Georgia in 2020.
James Stevens, a student at the Savannah College of Art and Design, attended multiple Harris rallies and said the atmosphere of the election was much more stressful than during past rallies.
“There’s obviously a different context and a different atmosphere; we’re actually seeing the results,” Stevens said. “During those rallies [in 2020], we were hyping everybody to get out there and vote, but now everybody’s voted. The polls are closed, so now we’re just anxiously waiting.”
Stevens said he was feeling relatively calm because the election was out of his control.
“I’m actually pretty calm, surprisingly,” Stevens said. “I’ve done everything I could do. I’ve been canvassing. I voted early. I voted on the first Friday of early voting in Georgia, and I’ve done some phone banking. I’ve done donations. I’ve done all I can do, so now I just need to wait.”
At the Georgia GOP Election Watch Party at the Buckhead Grand Hyatt, attendee Rachel Joseph also expressed a sense of relief that the election is coming to a close.
“Honestly, I’m just waiting for it to be over,” Republican watch party attendee Rachel Joseph said. “This has been a very intense election.”
Dalton resident Dianne Putnam also attended the Georgia GOP Watch Party and believed that Trump would win the 2024 election in Georgia.
“Right now, I think it’ll be Trump in a landslide,” Putnam said. “However, we don’t know the cheating the Democrats will do, and we don’t know the fraud they’ll commit.”
Taryn Edwards, who is from Stone Mountain, attended the Georgia Democratic Election Watch Party at the Hyatt Regency Downtown and said she was nervous on election night because the results would directly impact her life.
“[I am] worried about the policy changes, worried about jobs, because I work in public health,” Edwards said. “I’m grant-funded, so I’m extremely worried about it.”
At polling locations and watch parties across Fulton County, Southerner staffers collected data in an informal survey on the top issues that decided voters’ decisions in the 2024 election.
The top three issues from the poll were democracy, accounting for 36.5%; abortion, accounting for 25%; and the economy, accounting for 23.1%.
Friend and campaigner for the late civil rights leader John Lewis, Bobby Paul believes that civic engagement and research of candidates is vital to an informed electorate.
“Demand civics in your schools, current events, critical thinking, phones and technology, but also engage with each other face-to-face,” Paul said. “We tend to be a nation of talkers, myself included, more than listeners. Really try to go to bed at night feeling that you’ve tried to make a difference and make the world a better place, and that you’ve tried to honor every person, unless it’s impossible.”
Kimberly Brown voted at David T. Howard Middle School on Election Day. She believes certain democratic freedoms are on the line in this election.
“On the line is our freedom, our freedom to not be censored and our freedom to bear arms,” Brown said. “The First and the Second Amendment are on the line. My absentee ballot didn’t get to me in time, so I had to fly into Atlanta just to vote.”
Brown was a speaker at Trump’s rally in Pittsburgh on Nov. 4, and she utilizes her digital platform to advocate for issues she believes are important.
“I use my platform of social media to speak to others,” Brown said. “I [have been] on Fox two times, and I just spoke at the Trump Pittsburgh rally yesterday.”
John Rogowski voted on Election Day at The Episcopal Cathedral of St. Philip and believes that many facets of democracy will be affected by this election, including the Supreme Court.
“The reason I actually voted was because of how the Supreme Court justices are elected by the president,” Rogowski said. “I think [that] people underestimate the power of the Supreme Court justices, and the president picks the Supreme Court justices. That’s the main reason I decided to vote today.”
Abortion was ranked the second-most important for topics among surveyed voters. Since the reversal of Roe v. Wade by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022, reproductive rights have been a high priority for many Americans.
The Harris-Walz campaign has said she would pass a bill to protect reproductive freedom, while the Trump-Vance campaign believes freedom to decide should be left up to the states.
Susannah Horton voted at Virginia-Highland Elementary School on Election Day. She believes that the most divisive issue for her currently is reproductive rights.
“Women’s rights are on the line: the right to choose and protect ourselves the way we want to,” Horton said. “I also think that democracy is on the line. The most harmful thing that happened under Trump’s last administration was changes to the Supreme Court. If more of that happens, I think that that would really change our country in the long-term.”
Marie Mitchell voted for Harris because of her stance on reproductive freedom.
“I need the options,” Mitchell said. “If I eventually have a baby and anything goes wrong, I need to be able to have options for what happens to my body … Everything is at stake. I mean, what you can do, what you can do with your body and what you can do in this world, is at stake.”
The economy came in third in the survey for most important issues. Katherine Gary voted on Election Day at Virginia-Highland Elementary and believes that the economy is the most important topic for her decision.
“The economy is number one,” Gary said. “When everyone’s doing well, nonprofits benefit, more social programs benefit, senior citizens benefit. I’m also worried about having a weak president. There’s so many wars rampaging in different countries and their influence on the increased wave of immigrants. There are good immigrants, my parents are some, but there’s also a high wave of criminal activity that comes over and people take advantage of that.”
Alice Park, who voted at Morningside Presbyterian Church, said although she voted for Harris, she considered Trump because of his economic policies.
“It was a really hard decision, honestly, because I think his economic policy was really strong, and I believe he’s a really strong businessman, and he can get us out of this recession and get our economy to where it needs to be,” Park said.
Stevens said the verdict of this election will impact the country and the world for years to come, due to the difference in stances between Harris and Trump.
“No matter what happens, it’s going to be a historic election,” Stevens said. “We’re either going to have our first female president ever, our first black woman president from Howard University, or we’re going to have a criminal felon president who acts like a mob boss in the political arena. So, either way, it’s gonna be an intense night, but I’ll be watching from afar.”
