Sen. Warnock wins reelection in Georgia, netting Democrats 51 Senate seats

Yahoo Finance Live anchors discuss Raphael Warnock’s Georgia victory, securing the Democratic majority in Senate.

Video transcript

BRAD SMITH: Democrat Reverend Raphael Warnock defeating Republican challenger Herschel Walker in the Georgia runoffs. Warnock's victory securing a firm majority for Democrats in the Senate and closing out disappointing midterms for Republicans. Here with more, we've got Yahoo Finance's Rick Newman to help us break this down. Rick, what did we see ultimately play out and transpire in Georgia? And what does this mean for Georgia's future as well, perhaps as a swing state?

RICK NEWMAN: Yeah. Well, first of all, the election went about as polls suggested it would. So the polls actually turned out to be correct on this one. Raphael Warnock, the Democrat, won by a couple of percentage points over Herschel Walker, call it 51 to 49, roughly.

So Georgia now has two Democratic senators. And a few years back, I don't think anybody saw that coming. Now it still has a Republican governor, but we're seeing a realignment of what you might call the swing states in big elections. So it used to be Ohio. As Ohio went, so went the nation. Not so much anymore. Ohio has tended to become Republican.

But we're seeing swing states emerge in Georgia and also Arizona. Arizona, purple state. So this is all going to play out, of course, in 2024. But for now, the net result of the midterms for the Senate are that Democrats actually gained one seat. That was because they flipped Pennsylvania, and they defended all their other seats. So the Democrats have to be happy about that because they overperformed.

JULIE HYMAN: And yesterday was not just a defeat for Republicans generally. It was a defeat for former president Trump specifically, who had been a big backer of Walker, and then there was a legal defeat suffered for his company as well.

RICK NEWMAN: Trump is having a terrible end to 2022. So, in this lawsuit in New York City, where the district attorney there has been prosecuting Trump's company for tax fraud and related things, a jury found the company guilty on all of 17 counts. Now that does not mean Trump-- they did not prosecute Donald Trump directly or any individuals. They went after the company, and the company is probably going to have to pay a fine. Not a big fine, so more like reputational damage.

But look, the tide is turning big time for Trump here. There are other legal cases against him that are getting considerably more serious. There's the federal case with the Justice Department and the document-- the classified documents Trump took after he left office. There's the election fraud case in Georgia.

And then there is just Trump's political ability. He's turning into the kiss of death for Republican candidates and the Republic pattern. We clearly saw now that the midterms are over is that Trump can get candidates nominated in the primary elections. I mean, he still has that degree of control within the Republican Party. But these are, by and large, candidates that cannot win in general elections.

So Trump is becoming a multiple loser. I mean, he, obviously, had an upset win in 2016, but he cost Republicans control of Congress in 2018. He lost in 2020. He directly lost the Senate because of the two runoffs in Georgia for Republicans in 2020. And now he has contributed to a major underperformance by Republicans in 2022. So I'm sure Democrats are hoping that Trump's influence continues to dominate within the Republican Party because maybe it'll help them lose in 2024.

BRIAN SOZZI: Yahoo Finance senior columnist Rick Newman always bringing that fire for us. We'll talk to you soon.