WABE’s Week In Review: Biden, Pence Rally In Georgia And The State Gets Some Vaccine Doses
Georgia’s two U.S. Senate runoff races on Jan. 5 continue to bring national politicians to the state to stump for their party’s candidate.
On Tuesday, President-elect Joe Biden was in Atlanta for a drive-in rally calling for the same turnout that elected him to elect Democrats Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff.
“Now you’re going to have to do it again,” said Biden. “Come Jan. 5, you’ve got to vote in record numbers again. Because yes, the lives of every Georgian still depend on what you do. And yes, you still need to vote as if your life depends on it because it does.”
Republicans were here rallying too. Vice President Mike Pence made his fourth stop in Georgia since the November general election, rousing support for Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue in Columbus on Thursday before heading off to Macon.
“It all comes down to Georgia,” said Pence. “So stay in the fight. Stay in the fight for integrity in our elections. Stay in the fight to defend the Republican majority in the Senate.”
It was also on Thursday when a judge in Augusta dismissed another Republican lawsuit over the elections…this one seeking to change absentee ballot rules ahead of the runoff elections.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger announced this week that his office will work with a research team from the University of Georgia to conduct a statewide study of absentee ballot signatures from the November election.
Raffenspeger says he took this step to fight the disinformation that continues to be spread by President Trump, his lawyers and his supporters, not because there’s been any evidence of widespread fraud.
“In my office, we will continue to present the facts in a respectful manner, said Raffensperger. “We will continue to try and answer each and every question. The facts are on our side.”
A separate audit of absentee ballot signatures will take place in Cobb County starting next week because of a specific allegation of irregularities there.
Raffensperger also continued to urge all eligible Georgia voters to cast a ballot in the Jan. 5 elections.
One way Georgians can cast a ballot is by using one of the drop boxes around the state.
So far, more than a million absentee ballots have gone out in Georgia for the Jan. 5 runoff elections, and many voters will use absentee ballot drop boxes to return them.
The state’s top public health official Dr. Kathleen Toomey took the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine at Atlanta’s Grady Memorial Hospital on Thursday.
“I think that people don’t understand how difficult it has been for everyone here at Grady, and all of our hospitals, working night and day with our COVID patients,” said Toomey. “I feel like we have this ray of hope that we didn’t even have a few months ago.”
Toomey was joined by Gov. Brian Kemp, who said we still have a long fight ahead in preventing the spread of COVID-19 as the vaccine likely won’t be available to the general public for many months.
The confirmed death toll from COVID stands at more than 9,300 in Georgia and more than 300,000 across the U.S.
And for months, the New York Times has been working to tell some of their stories through a project called “Those We’ve Lost.”
WABE Health Reporter Sam Whitehead spoke with Dan Wakin, an obituaries editor at the New York Times, about the project on a recent episode of our coronavirus podcast, “Did You Wash Your Hands?”
Public Broadcasting Atlanta named a long-time Turner executive as its new president and chief executive officer this week.
Jennifer Dorian replaces Wonya Lucas, who left PBA and WABE to become the Crown Media Family Networks president and CEO.
Dorian, who starts Jan. 11, most recently served as the general manager for Turner Classic Movies.
She spoke with WABE’s Rose Scott on “Closer Look” this week.
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