NBC News projected Tuesday that Herschel Walker, the former pro football player and businessman endorsed by Donald Trump, will win the Republican Senate primary in Georgia.
According to NBC, Walker will face off against Warnock in the general election. A special election was held last year.
The outcome of the race could change the balance of power in the Senate, where Democrats hold a razor-thin majority. The chamber is split evenly between Republicans and Democrats, and Democratic Vice President Harris holds the tie-breaking vote.
The candidates are virtually tied in early polls, according to RealClearPolitics.
The primary races in Georgia, a swing state that narrowly voted for President Joe Biden in the 2020 election, are the biggest test to date of Trump's influence over the Republican Party.
Most of the candidates Trump endorsed in the election cycle have won their primaries, though many of them were not competitive. After a single term in the White House, the former president has held onto his position as the defacto leader of the GOP.
Even if the former president did not endorse them, many Republican primary candidates tried to appeal to the party's base by talking up their pro-Trump credentials. GOP hopefuls in many cases have sought Trump's favor by embracing the falsehood that the election was stolen from him, raising the possibility that a wave of candidates who spread election conspiracies could take federal and state office next year.
Republicans hope to win majority control of the House and Senate in the November elections. The president's party tends to lose in the mid-term elections, and the lead-up to the primaries has been marked by high inflation and low approval ratings for Biden.
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