I Still Believe

Friends,

Before I share my thoughts about what happened last night, I want to say thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you for giving your time, your money and your resources to our Democratic candidates. Thank you for volunteering your time to phone bank and canvass for such a strong and historic slate of candidates. Thank you for standing up for our values—even in areas of the state where it is not popular to bleed blue.

Thank you for believing in us again.

In the end, that’s what it has all come down to. We had candidates running on our ticket—from the top to the bottom—who we could all believe in again.

Our candidates stood for our issues—better schools for our children, less gridlock in Washington, fair and accessible elections and a better, more responsive and ethical government.

And the Republicans were scared.

Make no mistake about it ya’ll, Georgia was, and is, in play.

Last night was the culmination of the Republicans pouring tens of millions of dollars into our state. Despite being outspent, Democrats were competitive until the end. And Republicans had their smallest margin of victory since 2002.

It stung like hell. That’s absolutely true. But we have some positive signs as well.
Michelle Nunn cut into GOP strongholds like Cobb and Gwinnett counties and won Douglas and Henry counties outright.

Our Senate Democrats maintained every seat. And our House Democrats continued to stop a GOP super-majority in the House. They held on to contested seats in districts in counties such as Douglas, Paulding, Coweta, Troup and Meriweather. No incumbents were lost.

Georgia is now a battleground state for 2016. We were as competitive as traditional battlegrounds like Ohio and North Carolina, and we have two years to continue building our infrastructure for 2016 and beyond.

I understand taking a bit of time to lick these wounds. But not too much time. We have work to do. We will continue to build. We will continue to raise hope. We will continue to believe in Democrats.

Bleeding Blue in Laurens County,

DuBose Porter

Chairman, Democratic Party of Georgia