We did it!

Thank you so much for being on Team Warnock and putting your trust in me. To God be the glory!

I am a proud son of Savannah, Georgia, a coastal city known for its cobblestone streets, verdant town squares, and towering oak trees covered in gray Spanish moss. And like those oak trees, my roots go deep down and stretch wide in the soil of Waycross, Burke County, and Screven County. In a sense, I am Georgia – a living example and embodiment of its history and its hope, of its pain and promise, the brutality and possibility.

I am grateful that my mother, Pastor Verlene Warnock, could be with us last night at our victory party in Atlanta. As a teenager growing up in Waycross, GA, she used to pick somebody else’s cotton and tobacco. Once again in this runoff election, she helped pick her youngest son to be a United States senator. My late father, Rev. Jonathan Warnock, a preacher and a junkman, has long entered into the light, but he too is cheering us on.

Now, there will be folks across the country who will point to our victory and try to use it to argue that there is no voter suppression in Georgia.

Let me be clear. The fact that millions of Georgians endured hours in lines – and were willing to spend hours in line – lines that wrapped around buildings and went on for blocks, lines in the cold, lines in the rain, is most certainly not a sign voter suppression does not exist.

Instead, it is proof that the people will not allow their voices to be silenced. And I am proud to stand with you.

I believe that democracy is the political enactment of a spiritual idea. The notion that each of us has within us a spark of the divine – we all have value. And if we have value, we ought to have a voice.

Democrats, Republicans, and independents alike should all be able to agree that no matter what neighborhood you live in, you should have the same ability to exercise your right to vote.

As I return to serve as your Senator for another six years, it's that combination of faith, love, and hard work that will keep me focused on making change on behalf of our State and our country.

Some of you have heard me tell the story many times of how my dad would wake me up every morning at 6 a.m., no matter what time of year, no matter what day of the week, he’d say “Son, get dressed, put your shoes on.”

Well Georgia, I’m up, I’m dressed, I’m ready and I’ve got my shoes on. And I am so honored that you have placed your confidence in me one more time.

From the bottom of my heart, THANK YOU! God bless you, God bless this team.

Keep the faith! Keep looking up. 

Senator Reverend Raphael Warnock