Herschel Walker needs to pull a Jon Ossoff.
Ossoff, the U.S. Senate Democrat who won his Georgia runoff election over incumbent Republican David Perdue in January 2021, had to come from behind after trailing Perdue in the November 2020 general election. Perdue came within .22 of a percentage point of winning the election in November but lost to Ossoff in the runoff by 1.22%.
The Republican Walker trailed his Democratic opponent, Raphael Warnock, by .90 of a percentage point (just over 35,000 votes) in Tuesday's general election, but neither of the two won over 50%, triggering a December runoff. Chase Oliver, the libertarian candidate, won 2.07% of the vote.
The seven Georgia counties just over the border from Chattanooga will have something to say about that runoff.
In Warnock's first campaign, also in 2020, he faced U.S. Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who had been appointed to the seat by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp in 2019, and 18 other candidates in a November special election. None of the candidates came anywhere near winning 50% of the vote, so the top two finishers -- Loeffler and Warnock -- advanced to a January 2021 runoff, which Warnock won by 2%.
In five of the seven Chattanooga area Georgia counties on Tuesday, Walker ran behind Loeffler's vote percentage in the 2021 runoff. He also ran around 2% of the vote behind U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's 2022 winning percentage in five of the seven counties and an average of more than 5% behind Kemp, who won re-election, in all seven counties.
He'll need to turn out the same voters again for the Dec. 6 runoff, increase his percentage to more like Greene's or Kemp's, and repeat the pattern across the Peach State. If most of Oliver's Libertarian voters cast a ballot his way, he'll have a good chance to win.
But the national media, Hollywood and the full force of the Democratic Party will be sharpening their knives and descending on the state to make sure Walker doesn't win. On Thursday, for example, national Democrats dumped $7 million into the race. Walker will have his hands full.
Of the seven counties, Walker, Kemp and Greene did best in Murray County and worst -- relatively speaking (they all won huge majorities in each county) -- in Murray's neighboring Whitfield County. But Murray and Whitfield counties were the only ones of the seven to give Walker a bigger percentage of the vote on Tuesday than Loeffler got in the runoff.
Greene won between 78.8% and 84.8% in six of the seven counties, which are rather lopsided totals considering the race -- according to opensecrets.org -- attracted among the most money of House campaigns in the country. The controversial congresswoman was, according to the site, outraised by her opponent, Marcus Flowers, by more than $3 million.
As solid as her strength was in all seven counties, she ran behind Kemp by an average of 6.37% in the counties and had a fall-off in support in each of the seven from 2020, when she made her first run for the office.
Her decline ranged from .96 of a percentage point in Whitfield County to 4.09% in Catoosa County and 4.14% in Walker County. The seven averaged a drop of 2.65%, according to unofficial totals.
So has Georgia's 14th District had enough of her 2020 presidential election denials, of her sometimes absurd pronouncements, of her occasional hateful accusations?
Obviously, some voters have but not enough for her not to be able to weather a Republican primary challenger or any Democrat-come-lately who may appear on the horizon. No, most voters see her as the House version of former President Trump -- willing to say what she believes, willing to take on the media and unwilling to back down.
The fact that she didn't live in the district when she ran in the 2020 primary, her removal from House committee assignments by House leadership and the decision by her husband to file for divorce from her in September evidently haven't touched her.
Greene and Kemp, then, will now go on their merry way -- Greene to a likely slim GOP House, which may give her some committee assignments, and Kemp to a state that for the ninth straight year recently was named by Area Development magazine as the top state for business -- but neither could bring along Walker, whose race may be the determining factor in the party that controls the Senate.
No pressure.