President Joe Biden on Friday traveled to Boston to visit the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, where he participated in a phone bank for incumbent Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock, who is running to keep his seat representing Georgia in the next Congress – a state notably further south than Biden's stop in Massachusetts. 

Days before polls close on Tuesday, Biden still has no plans to visit Georgia, marking the culmination of Biden’s support-from-a-distance strategy that he employed throughout the midterms and that his aides credit with helping his party beat expectations in key races.

 

What You Need To Know

  • President Joe Biden on Friday traveled to Boston to visit the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, where he participated in a phone bank for Georgia's incumbent Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock

  • Days before polls close on Tuesday, Biden still has no plans to visit Georgia, marking the culmination of Biden’s support-from-a-distance strategy that he employed throughout the midterms

  • The president, without mentioning his name, on Friday took aim at Republican challenger Herschel Walker, a former football star whose campaign has been dogged by numerous allegations from his previous romantic partners and family alike

  • Later in the day, Biden will appear at a fundraiser for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which has spent millions of dollars to boost Warnock’s campaign

 

“This is a guy who needs our help and I think, you know, we have a chance to do something,” Biden told members of the IBEW 103 labor union, going on to highlight why it is imperative to have Warnock in the Senate for both Georgia and Biden’s agenda for the country at large. 

The president, without mentioning his name, took aim at Republican challenger Herschel Walker, a former football star whose campaign has been dogged by numerous allegations from his previous romantic partners and family alike. 

“This is not a referendum on Warnock. This is a choice,” Biden said of Georgia’s Senate race. “A choice between two men. One man who does not deserve to be in the United States Senate.” 

“The other man is a really truly decent, honorable guy,” the president said of Warnock. 

Biden, who has long supported labor unions, on Friday said that phone banks like the ones hosted by IBEW 103 might make or break Georgia’s Senate election. 

“This race in Georgia is the second time there's been a runoff in two years here. It’s really, really critical,” Biden said, adding: “What you're doing really makes a gigantic difference.” 

It was a message shared by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., in her own address to IBEW workers on Friday, where she said her own Senate victory was thanks in large part to support from labor unions. 

Warren said she told Warnock earlier this week that "labor is going to be making calls for you in Georgia,” to which the incumbent responded: “We're going to get it done.” 

Biden capped off the afternoon by encouraging volunteers to keep calling and campaigning through the final days of the special election, which will officially end next Tuesday. Already, early voter turnout has hit records in the Peach State, with over 1.4 million people casting their ballots since early voting opened on Monday. 

“Thank you, keep it up. Call, call, call,” Biden said Friday. “It ain't over 'til it's over. So let's wait ‘til the last vote’s in.”

Later in the day, Biden will appear at a fundraiser for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which has spent millions of dollars to boost Warnock’s campaign.

Aides said that the Boston trip was requested by Warnock’s campaign, and that Biden obliged, reflecting his promise to go wherever Democratic candidates wanted him in 2022.

“The President is willing to help Senator Warnock any way he can, however the senator wants him to get involved,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said this week.

Warnock, meanwhile, was joined by former President Barack Obama on Thursday for a campaign event, where they urged Democratic voters to keep pushing an apparent head start in early voting in the Georgia Senate runoff.

“If they didn’t get tired, you can’t get tired,” Obama told a crowd gathered in a cavernous former railroad repair shop east of downtown Atlanta.

“We’ve got to keep on showing up,” Warnock told the crowd at his largest event of the four-week runoff blitz. “We’ve got to keep on voting. We cannot let up for even a moment. We’ve got to keep our foot on the gas all the way to victory.”

Both Obama and Warnock criticized Walker, part of Democratic attacks that Walker is unqualified and untruthful.

“I believe in my soul that Georgia knows that Georgia is better than Herschel Walker,” Warnock said.

Warnock’s Republican opponent Herschel Walker on Friday made a campaign stop in Warner Robins, where he told attendees he “love(s)” the Green New Deal and would support it were the country ready for such a piece of legislation. 

“But we ain’t ready for no Green New Deal. [...] Have ya’ll seen any charging stations along the road?” Walker said. “You haven’t seen no charging station. Right now we’re not ready for it so we don’t need to be going in that direction.”

While not saying when he thought Georgia might be ready for more investments in green technologies, Walker said he would “I’ll raise my hand and say we’ve got to do it” when he feels the time is right.