Morehouse College alumnus Reverend Raphael Warnock just made history by becoming the state of Georgia’s first Black senator! Considering that Georgia has long been a red state, this Democrat’s triumphant upset is remarkable.
“Stacey Abrams made it her business to go out and register people of color,” said Andra Gillespie, a professor of political science at Emory University. “She went out and registered thousands of people to vote and then created the tools to help remind them about the election process.” Democrats winning both races means they’ll control both houses of Congress and the White House. – This means the democratic party has the first chance within a decade that could usher in sweeping change on everything from income inequality to climate change in the world’s biggest economy.
Rev. Warnock had this to say on the TODAY show “I can’t tell you how honored I am that the people of my home state where I was born and raised and educated at Morehouse College have decided to send me to the United States Senate to represent their concerns at this defining moment in American history,”
Warnock has a sort of rags to riches story. Just like fellow Morehouse graduate Martin Luther King, Jr., Warnock grew up to become a pastor at the landmark Ebenezer Baptist Church. Yet as one of twelve children, he grew up in public housing. He was the first of his siblings to go to college. His father was a veteran, businessman, and pastor. His mother would pick cotton for work. It is something that he reflected heavily on after his win.
“The 82-year-old hands that used to pick somebody else’s cotton went to the polls and picked her youngest son to be a United States senator,” Warnock said in a live-streamed address, which he posted to his Twitter page. “The improbable journey that led me to this place in this historic moment in America could only happen here.”
