Georgia voters rendered an unmistakable election verdict backing Donald Trump’s White House bid, delivering him a solid victory that reasserted Republican ascendancy in the state and set Democrats down a restless path of soul-searching about their party’s future.

The president-elect carved a red path across Georgia to defeat Vice President Kamala Harris that halted years of Democratic gains and proved that Republican contenders can still win the state by focusing almost exclusively on the party’s conservative base.

There was no dramatic shift in one part of the state or with one voter bloc, as there was in 2016 when Trump lost key parts of Atlanta’s suburbs or four years later when Joe Biden’s narrow win was boosted by split-ticket independents who once voted reliably Republican.

Instead, an Atlanta Journal-Constitution analysis showed Trump benefited from higher turnout in Republican-friendly areas that he turned a deeper shade of red, while also largely cutting his losses in vote-rich metro Atlanta counties where Harris dominated.

The Republican improved on his 2020 vote share in more than 130 of Georgia’s 159 counties, from Democratic strongholds such as Fulton County to ruby-red rural areas. In Brantley County, for instance, Trump went from 90% to 91% of the vote in four years.

Almost as importantly, Trump limited his losses in populous metro Atlanta, where Harris won the lion’s share of voters. DeKalb County, for example, saw about 5,500 fewer votes cast than in 2020 — and Trump earned about 4,100 more votes there than he did four years earlier.

Even in exurban areas where Harris slightly eroded Trump’s lead, the Republican still made gains. A turnout surge in Cherokee County added 18,000 more votes since 2020, and he still carried it by a two-thirds margin despite a slightly better showing from Harris.

Overall, Harris improved on Biden’s vote total in Georgia by about 60,000 votes. But Trump gained nearly 200,000 votes on his overall Georgia tally four years ago.

For Republicans, Trump’s performance in Georgia was more remarkable given the diversifying electorate. About 58% of the state’s 5.2 million voters were white, down a point from 2020 due to more minor upticks in Black and Hispanic turnout.

Brandon Phillips, who was Trump’s Georgia campaign chief in 2016 and an adviser to his next two bids, said the Republican’s election operation this cycle was the most “disciplined” of the three.

“The team understood they needed to run up the score in rural Georgia while improving or holding his position in metro Atlanta, and they did just that,” Phillips said. “The strategy to pursue low-propensity voters paid off.”

arvin.temkar@ajc.com

arvin.temkar@ajc.com

On the other side, U.S. Rep. Nikema Williams, who chairs the Democratic Party of Georgia, said a “course correction” is needed ahead of 2026 midterms when U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff stands for another term and other statewide offices are on the ballot.

“We needed to do more to shave off the margins in our rural and red counties. We needed to run up the numbers more right here in metro Atlanta,” she said. “It’s a numbers game. There’s no secret sauce to winning elections.”

She added that apathy was Harris’ biggest obstacle to notching the first back-to-back Democratic presidential wins in Georgia since Jimmy Carter was on the ballot.

“We were not fighting against Donald Trump to get our voters to the polls,” Williams said. “We were fighting against the couch.”

‘Change agent’

For all the hand-wringing about the Democratic Black base, Harris didn’t suffer an exodus of the party’s most loyal voters. Exit polls showed her 86% of support kept pace with the same levels that Biden, Ossoff and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock captured in their wins.

Instead, defections by swing voters, coupled with overall higher turnout, were key to Harris’ defeat. Surveys of voters show Harris won only about a third of white women — and fewer than a quarter of white men. Trump won independents by a 54% to 43% clip in those polls.

Those results overshadowed some of the few bright spots for Democrats, who drove the south and east metro Atlanta suburbs of Fayette, Henry, Newton and Rockdale counties further to the left even as much of the rest of the state shifted to the right.

“People are hurting economically, and I believe that proved too much for Harris to overcome,” said Erick Allen, a former legislator who once chaired the Cobb County Democrats. “She was viewed as the incumbent, and voters didn’t believe she would offer change from the current administration.”

arvin.temkar@ajc.com

Allen found consensus on that point with Georgia GOP Chair Josh McKoon, who said he viewed the race with a similar prism: “The candidate who is seen as the change agent will win.”

Trump’s victory march across Georgia mirrored a path across the nation that dismantled the “blue wall” of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin; flipped control of the U.S. Senate to the GOP; and put Republicans on the verge of regaining control of Washington.

Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Eric Johnson, a former Georgia Senate GOP leader, freely admits he’s been skeptical of Trump over the years. But he also said he knows why voters like him are willing to back the Republican.

“They want a disrupter. They are tired of endless wars. They are tired of unchecked immigration. They want the media to report news without bias,” Johnson said. “They don’t like the woke social agenda. And they support cops.”

‘Out of the bubble’

Within Democratic circles, the debate over the Harris campaign’s policies and strategy began long before the results were in.

As polls showed a widening gender gap, DeKalb Chief Executive Michael Thurmond was just one of the Democratic leaders who raised alarms about Harris’ dismal showing with blue-collar men of all racial backgrounds.

Marcus Flowers, who mounted an unsuccessful 2022 bid in northwest Georgia to unseat firebrand U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Rome, said there’s no “sugarcoating” Democratic defeats — but there is a way to learn from them.

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“I’m confident that we can hold the line for these next four years,” he said. “But we have to use that time to present a vision of an America that works for everyone and one that will win back working-class voters.”

Likewise for state Rep. Mack Jackson, a moderate Democrat from Sandersville who appeared to stave off a surprisingly strong Republican challenge by fewer than 50 votes. He offered a warning to a party he said has grown too reliant on urban and suburban votes.

“Our party has to get out of the bubble in Atlanta and work more in rural Georgia to engage constituents in our part of the state,” he said. “We need to prove to voters that Democrats are for all Georgians — and not just for Atlanta.”

Georgia Republicans will soon face tests, too, as party leaders work to prove the conservative coalition Trump built can be fashioned into a long-term majority. For now, though, GOP leaders are basking in the afterglow of his win.

“This was not eking out a win. This was not a win in recount territory. This was a clear victory for Donald Trump,” McKoon said. “I feel like that’s a clear mandate for him and a vindication of the strategy that we executed.”

AJC data analyst Charles Minshew contributed to this article.