Democrats outpace GOP in approval ratings in Georgia: poll

Democrats are significantly outpacing Republicans in their approval ratings in Georgia in a sign of the party’s burgeoning strength in the Deep South state, according to a new poll from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The poll, conducted by the University of Georgia and released Saturday, shows the state’s two newly elected Democratic senators and President Biden with net positive approval ratings, while Gov. Brian Kemp (R) and former President Trump have approval ratings that are underwater and sinking.

The results come after Democrats flipped both Senate seats in runoffs earlier this month and Biden won Georgia in November, stunning upsets in a state that for years had a stiff Republican bent. 

Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff, who just unseated former Sen. David Perdue (R) in Georgia, had an approval rating of about 50 percent, while just 40 percent of voters had an unfavorable view of him. Sen. Raphael Warnock (D), who flipped Georgia’s other Senate seat in a special election and will have to run for a full term in 2022, has a net positive approval rating at 54-37. 

Another 52 percent of voters had a favorable view of Biden, compared with just 41 percent who had an unfavorable view. Stacey Abrams, the 2018 Democratic gubernatorial nominee who is expected to run for that post again in 2022, has a similarly positive 51-41 approval rating.

Meanwhile, Kemp and Trump find themselves on increasingly faulty footing with voters in the Peach State.

The governor’s approval rating stands at just 42 percent, while 51 percent of voters disapprove of the job he’s doing. Following rebukes from Republicans over his unwillingness to go along with Trump’s efforts to overturn Georgia’s presidential election results, Kemp’s disapproval among the GOP has shot up to 36 percent from just 8 percent a year ago.

Meanwhile, 40 percent of Georgia voters approve of Trump’s job in the White House, which was capped off by groundless voter fraud claims and the Jan. 6 Capitol Hill riot. Fifty-seven percent disapprove of the job Trump did in office. By comparison, 48 percent of voters approved of the job Trump was doing last year.

Fifty-seven percent of voters also said Trump is responsible for a “great deal” or a “good amount” of blame for egging on the deadly mob on Jan. 6, and 51 percent of voters said the House was right to impeach him over it.

The results of the poll mark a role reversal in Georgia, which burst onto the scene as a top battleground state with the victories for Biden, Ossoff and Warnock. Both parties are expected to contest the state heavily when it hosts Senate and gubernatorial races in 2022.

Republicans are likely to try to make up ground in Georgia next year as they turn the page from the Trump era, but Democrats have boasted that their trio of victories in the last cycle is only a harbinger of mushrooming enthusiasm among the party base. 

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll surveyed 858 registered voters from Jan. 17 to Jan. 28 and has a margin of error of 4.2 percentage points.