WASHINGTON - The Democratic Party appears poised to retake control of the United States Senate. It has flipped one of two seats in a historic victory in a run-off election in the state of Georgia and is leading in the other as at late morning Wednesday (Jan 6).
Democrat Raphael Warnock, a 51-year-old pastor of civil rights giant Martin Luther King Jr’s former congregation, will become Georgia’s first Black senator with his defeat of Republican incumbent Kelly Loeffler.
Democrat challenger Jon Ossoff has declared victory with a slim lead of 16,000 votes over his Republican opponent David Perdue, a gap that is expected to widen as remaining votes to be counted come from areas that skew strongly Democrat.
At 33, he will be Georgia’s first Jewish senator and the country’s youngest since President-elect Joe Biden was first elected to the Senate in 1973 at age 30.
The results were a stunning turnaround from November, when both Democrats polled slightly behind the Republicans.
They underscored the political shift in the formerly deeply Republican state of Georgia, which has not sent a Democrat to the Senate since 1996, but which voted for Mr Biden in November after months of campaigning and voter registration drives by local Democrat activists and organisers.
It could also signal a rejection of US President Donald Trump, who personally campaigned in Georgia for the Republican senators, and his politics of division and strategy of falsely alleging electoral fraud. He doubled down on Tuesday as Mr Warnock’s victory became likely, claiming without evidence on Twitter that the election was rigged against Republicans.
Mr Warnock paid tribute to his mother, remarking on the improbability of his journey made possible “because this is America”, as he promised to work for all Georgians.
“The other day, because this is America, 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 US senator,” he said in a late-night video message to supporters.
Mr Raphael Warnock will be Georgia's first black senator. PHOTO: AFP
Should the Democrats flip the Senate, they will have unified control of Congress and the White House for the first time since 2009, albeit by the narrowest of majorities.
Both the Democrats and Republicans will have 50 seats in the Senate if Mr Ossoff wins, giving Vice-President Kamala Harris the tiebreaker vote.
It could take days to get a final tally for the outcome of the race between Mr Perdue and Mr Ossoff, as 17,000 military and overseas ballots, and some domestic absentee ballots, can still be counted as late as Friday. The narrow results will almost certainly spark legal challenges or recounts that also could delay a final determination of Senate control, according to newswire service Bloomberg.
Ms Loeffler campaigning in Sandy Springs, Georgia, on Jan 5, 2021. PHOTO: REUTERS
Meanwhile, Washington braces itself for high drama on Wednesday when Congress meets to count and announce Mr Biden’s electoral college win.
The day could see internal Republican Party tensions erupt into the open in Congress while pro-Trump protesters take to the streets. But all that would not change Mr Biden’s electoral college victory over Mr Trump – by 306 to 232.
The House of Representatives and Senate are to meet in a constitutionally prescribed joint session scheduled to start at 1pm to count the electoral votes, all of which have been lawfully certified by the states.
Supporters holding campaign signs for Senate candidates near a polling location in Marietta, Georgia, on Jan 5, 2021. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG
Mr Mike Pence, as president of the Senate,will preside over a roll call of the 50 states and Washington DC. Sealed certificates from each state, containing its electoral votes, will be opened and officially counted.
If at least one senator and one member of the House of Representatives object to a state’s results, both chambers will separately debate the objection and vote on whether to sustain it. To overturn a result, the House and the Senate must agree by a simple majority vote to do so.
So far, 13 Republican senators and around 140 Congressmen had said they will object to results, likely in at least six states that Mr Biden won: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
But 23 Republican senators had said they would not join the objections, which are all but certain to fail, given the Democrats’ control of the House.
BENGALURU: Criticism of India's approval of a local COVID-19 vaccine without proof of its efficacy grew on Wednesday (Jan 6) after news that a regulatory panel approved the shot just one day after asking the vaccine maker for more evidence it would work.
The recommendations of the Indian drugs regulator's subject expert committee (SEC) released on Tuesday show that the panel asked Bharat Biotech International to present more efficacy data for its COVID-19 shot before it could consider approving the treatment.
"After detailed deliberation, the committee recommended that the firm ... may perform interim efficacy analysis for further consideration of restricted emergency use approval," the SEC's recommendations in a Jan 1 meeting show.
The very next day, the committee recommended approving Bharat Biotech's vaccine for "restricted use in emergency situation in public interest as an abundant precaution".
The SEC also separately recommended emergency use authorisation for the Oxford University/AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, being produced by India's Serum Institute.
The greenlighting of Bharat Biotech's COVAXIN had already faced criticism from opposition lawmakers and health experts for lack of efficacy data, typically obtained from a large, Phase III human trial - which the manufacturer is still conducting.
News of the SEC's recommendations spurred further criticism.
"Was the Subject Expert Committee (SEC) approval a command performance? This is as serious as it can get," Manish Tewari, an opposition lawmaker, said on Twitter.
Health experts questioned why the SEC abruptly recommended approval one day after asking Bharat Biotech for more analysis.
"The SEC ... appears to have been pressured overnight into reconsidering its decision and giving approval the next day, albeit hedged in by many conditions," the All India People's Science Network, a network of science advocacy groups, said in a statement.
"We are perplexed at the abrupt change in thinking of the SEC from the first two meetings to the third day on which the approval was recommended while apparently discounting the need for efficacy data as the condition of the approval," the All India Drug Action Network, a nonprofit health watchdog, said.
Both Bharat Biotech and government officials have pointed to regulatory provisions that allow for quick drug approval for serious diseases even without Phase III trial data.
Neither India's drugs regulator nor Bharat Biotech responded to Reuters requests for comment on Wednesday.
Regulators also granted approval to Bharat Biotech's vaccine only "in clinical trial mode", unusually cryptic language that left some experts baffled.
"They've introduced terminologies that are confusing," said Giridhar Babu, a professor of epidemiology at the Public Health Foundation of India. "The phrase 'in clinical trial mode' is not generally a term you will see in approvals."
Any confusion around vaccines could harm immunisation programmes by causing distrust, Babu said. "It takes decades of work to build confidence in vaccines."
ATLANTA, GEORGIA (BLOOMBERG) - Democrat Raphael Warnock has won one US Senate seat in Georgia, the Associated Press reported early on Wednesday (Jan 6), leaving control of the chamber in question until the result of the state's other run-off election is decided.
Mr Warnock, a pastor and voting rights activist, will be Georgia's first black senator. He defeated Republican Senator Kelly Loeffler, who has not conceded.
In a video statement released a few hours before the race was called, Mr Warnock referred to his humble beginnings in the "Kayton Homes housing projects of Savannah, Georgia" as one of 12 children.
"So, I stand before you as a man who knows that the improbable journey that led me to this place in this historic moment in America could only happen here."
A winner has not been called in a second Georgia Senate run-off between Republican David Perdue and Democrat Jon Ossoff.
To gain control of the Senate, and bolster President-elect Joe Biden's agenda, Democrats will need to win both seats. In that race, Mr Ossoff held a narrow edge, according to an AP tally early on Wednesday morning.
Mr Warnock, 51, is the senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, a post once held by Martin Luther King Jr.
He ran on a platform of increased access to healthcare, expanding Medicaid, and protecting voting rights.
He painted Ms Loeffler, the richest member of Congress, as out of touch.
Ms Loeffler campaigning with her supporters in Sandy Springs, Georgia, on Jan 5, 2021. PHOTO: REUTERS
Ms Loeffler was appointed by Governor Brian Kemp to replace Senator Johnny Isakson, who retired for health reasons.
She is married to Mr Jeffrey Sprecher, the chief executive officer of the Intercontinental Exchange, the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, who recently became a billionaire.
She had repeatedly portrayed Mr Warnock as "radical liberal" who didn't share Georgia values and would steer the country towards socialism.
A winner has not been called in a second Georgia Senate run-off between Republican David Perdue and Democrat Jon Ossoff. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG
Mr Warnock will now fill the remaining two years of Mr Isakson's term.
He received a bachelor's degree from Morehouse College and a PhD from Union Theological Seminary.
He was an assistant pastor at Abyssinian Baptist Church in New York and senior pastor at Douglas Memorial Community Church in Baltimore, before coming to Ebenezer Baptist in 2005.
A centre for activism on behalf of the black community, the church is a must-stop for national politicians. The races for both Senate were forced run-offs after no candidate secured more than 50 per cent of the vote in the November election.
Mr Warnock's victory ends a more than 30-year losing streak for Democrats in statewide run-offs.
ATLANTA, Georgia: Democrats and Republicans were locked in tight United States Senate races in Georgia on Tuesday (Jan 5) as final votes were counted in a showdown that will decide whether President-elect Joe Biden enjoys control of Congress or faces stiff Republican opposition to his reform plans.
The leads swung back and forth between Republican incumbents David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler and Democratic challengers Jon Ossoff and the Reverend Raphael Warnock.
With 96 per cent reporting, Warnock was ahead of Loeffler by less than a percentage point and Ossoff had pulled into a dead heat with Perdue, according to Edison Research.
Warnock and Ossoff made big gains on the Republicans after a batch of votes was reported from Democratic-leaning DeKalb County.
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger told CNN late on Tuesday that vote counting in the two races would stop overnight and resume in the morning, and that more should be known by noon on Wednesday (1am Thursday, Singapore time) about the results of the very close elections.
"They're probably going to take a break here, I think, in the next hour. Try and get as much work as they can done tonight ... At least, record exactly how many ballots are out there and then get as much scanning done tomorrow," he said.
"Hopefully by noon we'll have a better idea where we are."
Voting hours were extended less than an hour in a handful of precincts following a judge's order. While voting was strong in some spots, state election officials reported light turnout early in the day, including across the deeply conservative region where President Donald Trump held a rally Monday night to encourage GOP voters to turn out in force.
UNUSUAL IMPORTANCE
The two Senate runoff elections are leftovers from the November general election, when none of the candidates hit the 50 per cent threshold. Democrats need to win both races to seize the Senate majority - and, with it, control of the new Congress when Biden takes office in two weeks.
A double Democratic win would create a 50-50 split in the Senate and give Vice President-elect Kamala Harris the tie-breaking vote after she and Biden take office on Jan 20. The party already has a narrow majority in the House of Representatives.
If Republicans hold even one of the two seats, they would effectively wield veto power over Biden's political and judicial appointees as well as many of his legislative initiatives in areas such as economic relief, climate change, healthcare and criminal justice.
No Democrat has won a US Senate race in Georgia in 20 years, but opinion surveys showed both races as exceedingly close.
In one contest, Republican Loeffler, a 50-year-old former businesswoman who was appointed to the Senate less than a year ago by the state’s governor, faced Democrat Warnock, 51, who serves as the senior pastor of a historic black church in Atlanta where Martin Luther King Jr grew up and preached.
The other election pitted 71-year-old former business executive Perdue, a Republican who held his Senate seat until his term expired on Sunday, against Democrat Ossoff, a documentary filmmaker and former congressional aide. At just 33 years old, Ossoff would be the Senate’s youngest member.
The unusual importance for the runoffs has transformed Georgia, once a solidly Republican state, into one of the nation’s premier battlegrounds during the final days of Trump's presidency.
Biden and Trump campaigned for their candidates in person on the eve of the election, though some Republicans feared Trump may have confused voters by continuing to make wild claims of voter fraud as he tries to undermine Biden's victory. The president assailed Raffensperger, a Republican, repeatedly this week for rejecting his fraud contentions and raised the prospect on Twitter that some ballots might not be counted even as votes were being cast Tuesday afternoon.
There was no evidence of wrongdoing.
RECORD TURNOUT
Voters mark their ballots at the Lawrenceville Road United Methodist Church in Tucker, Ga. during the Senate runoff election Tuesday morning, Jan. 5, 2021. (AP Photo/Ben Gray)
In Atlanta's Buckhead neighbourhood, 37-year-old Kari Callaghan said she voted "all Democrat" on Tuesday, an experience that was new for her.
"I’ve always been Republican, but I’ve been pretty disgusted by Trump and just the way the Republicans are working and especially the news this weekend about everything happening in Georgia,” she said. "I feel like for the Republican candidates to still stand there with Trump and campaign with Trump feels pretty rotten. This isn’t the conservative values that I grew up with."
But 56-year-old Will James said he voted "straight GOP".
He said he was concerned by the Republican candidates' recent support of Trump’s challenges of the presidential election results in Georgia, "but it didn’t really change the reasons I voted”.
"I believe in balance of power, and I don’t want either party to have a referendum, basically," he said.
Poll worker Jennifer Jones, right, signs voter Taylor Ledford in at a polling place at Dawnville United Methodist Church in Dawnville, Ga., on Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2021. (Matt Hamilton/Chattanooga Times Free Press via AP)
Even before Tuesday, Georgia had shattered its turnout record for a runoff with more than 3 million votes by mail or during in-person advance voting in December. The state’s previous record was 2.1 million in a 2008 Senate runoff.
The early turnout was expected to benefit Democrats, as it helped Biden in November become the first Democratic presidential candidate to win Georgia since 1992. Republicans were counting on a big turnout on Tuesday to make up for the Democrats' perceived early vote advantage.
"GEORGIA! Get out and VOTE," Trump wrote on Tuesday in one of several tweets encouraging his loyalists to vote for the two Republican candidates on the ballot.
Loeffler has pledged to join a small but growing number of GOP senators protesting Congress’ expected certification of Biden’s victory on Wednesday. She and her allies have seized on snippets of Warnock’s sermons at the historic black church to cast him as extreme. Dozens of religious and civil rights leaders have pushed back.
HIGH STAKES
If Republicans win either seat, Biden would be the first incoming president in more than a century to enter the Oval Office facing a divided Congress. In that case, he would have little shot for swift votes on his most ambitious plans to expand government-backed health care coverage, address racial inequality and combat climate change.
A Republican-controlled Senate also would create a rougher path to confirmation for Biden's Cabinet picks and judicial nominees.
Helen Thomason marks her ballot at the Lawrenceville Road United Methodist Church in Tucker, Ga. during the Senate runoff election Tuesday morning, Jan. 5, 2021. (AP Photo/Ben Gray)
This week's elections mark the formal finale to the heated 2020 election season more than two months after the rest of the nation finished voting. The results also will help demonstrate whether the political coalition that fuelled Biden's victory was an anti-Trump anomaly or part of a new landscape.
Biden won Georgia’s 16 electoral votes by about 12,000 votes out of 5 million cast in November.
While they have no merit, Trump’s claims about voter fraud in the 2020 election have resonated with Republican voters in Georgia. About 7 in 10 agree with his false assertion that Biden was not the legitimately elected president, according to AP VoteCast, a survey of more than 3,600 voters in the runoff elections.
Election officials across the country, including the Republican governors in Arizona and Georgia, as well as Trump’s former attorney general, William Barr, have confirmed that there was no widespread fraud in the November election. Nearly all the legal challenges from Trump and his allies have been dismissed by judges, including two tossed by the Supreme Court, where three Trump-nominated justices preside.
Even with Trump's claims, voters in both parties were drawn to the polls because of the high stakes. AP VoteCast found that 6 in 10 Georgia voters say Senate party control was the most important factor in their vote.
Voters register before casting their vote during Georgia's Senate runoff elections on Tuesday, Jan. 5, 2021, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson)
Democrats counted on driving a huge turnout of African Americans, young voters, college-educated Georgians and women, all groups that helped Biden win the state. Republicans, meanwhile, have been focused on energising their own base of white men and voters beyond the core of metro Atlanta.
In downtown Atlanta, Henry Dave Chambliss, 67, voted for the two Republicans. He said he wanted Republicans to keep Senate control to ensure the incoming Biden administration doesn’t slide "all the way to the left".
"I’m moderately successful and I know they will come after more of my money, which I’ve earned," Chambliss said. "I was born a Southern Democrat, and I just hope and pray that some moderate voices are heard and things stay more in the middle of the road."
WASHINGTON: Despite pressure from US President Donald Trump to help overturn his election loss, Vice President Mike Pence will stick to his ceremonial duties and not block Wednesday's (Jan 6) certification by Congress of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory, advisers said.
Trump ramped up pressure on Pence on Tuesday to block congressional certification of the November election results in an ongoing attempt to stay in power, after dozens of lawsuits by his campaign challenging the outcome failed in US courts.
The vice president, a loyal lieutenant during the four years of Trump's often chaotic presidency, has no plans to intervene and has told Trump he does not have the power to do so, even as he seeks to show support for the Republican president's quest.
Pence is set to preside over a joint session of Congress on Wednesday as it receives the results of the state-by-state Electoral College that determines the winner of presidential elections.
Biden, a Democrat, beat Trump 306-232 in the Electoral College and in the popular vote by more than 7 million ballots. Trump has declined to concede the election.
US states have already certified the results, and Pence's role on Wednesday as president of the Senate is to "open all the certificates", in the presence of the House of Representatives and the Senate, the US Constitution says.
Trump suggested Pence could do more than that.
"The Vice President has the power to reject fraudulently chosen electors," Trump wrote in a tweet, his latest unfounded suggestion that the election was marred by widespread fraud.
Pence told Trump on Tuesday he did not believe he had the power to block the certification, according to a source familiar with the subject. The New York Times first reported the contents of the conversation.
In a statement released late on Tuesday, Trump denied the report.
"The Vice President and I are in total agreement that the Vice President has the power to act," Trump said. “Our Vice President has several options under the US Constitution. He can decertify the results or send them back to the states for change and certification."
Trump's statement and tweet put more pressure on Pence, whose future political prospects are tied largely to his ability to please the president's base of supporters.
But advisers said on Tuesday night that the vice president's thinking about his role had not changed.
Trump's pressure campaign against his vice president took off at a campaign rally for Republican US Senate incumbents in Georgia on Monday night when he expressed hope that Pence would take action.
"If he doesn't come through, I won't like him quite as much," Trump said.
About a dozen Republican senators, as well as dozens of Republicans in the House, plan to object to the certification of the Electoral College results in Congress on Wednesday. The move has virtually no chance of overturning Biden's victory.
'WILL UPHOLD THE CONSTITUTION'
Current and former White House aides said the vice president planned to perform his ceremonial duties.
"He will be very supportive of the president, but again he'll stick to the Constitution," one former White House official who has regular contact with Pence's team told Reuters.
The vice president would make clear that he backs Trump, while sticking to the constraints of the role, the former official said.
"It is a ceremonial role. It is opening up envelopes and reading the contents of it," he said. "That's it."
Pence's chief of staff, Marc Short, told Reuters on Monday that the vice president "will uphold the Constitution and follow the statutory law".
On Friday, a Trump-appointed judge rejected a lawsuit brought by Republican members of Congress asking Pence to reject Electoral College results, saying they had no standing for such a suit.
One Trump adviser said the president had told others he would like Pence to fight harder for him.
The vice president has sought, so far, to express his support without repeating the president's false claims about the election. On Monday, during his own trip to Georgia, Pence said that Republican objections to the election would be heard, but he did not commit to taking action on them.
"I share the concerns of millions of Americans about voting irregularities. And I promise you, come this Wednesday, we'll have our day in Congress. We’ll hear the objections. We'll hear the evidence," he said.
Following a pattern throughout their partnership, Pence has kept Trump informed about his thinking. The former adviser said Pence likely walked the president through the restrictions of his role, informed by a weekend meeting with a congressional parliamentarian.
SINGAPORE - About 2,500 travellers have arrived in Singapore via reciprocal green lanes from June 8 to Dec 25 last year, with two among them testing positive for Covid-19, Health Minister Gan Kim Yong has said.
About 835 of the travellers came from three Asean states - Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia, he said in Parliament on Tuesday (Jan 5).
Another 1,640 or so came from countries in North-east Asia - China, South Korea and Japan - while about 15 arrived from Germany.
Mr Gan, who co-chairs the multi-ministry task force combating Covid-19, also said that as at Dec 26 last year, two people from Japan were detected with the virus during the mandatory test on arrival here for such travellers.
The reciprocal green lanes facilitate short-term essential business and official travel between Singapore and its counterpart countries or regions, and the first such arrangement kicked in on June 8 last year between Singapore and China, in what was then called a "fast lane".
Six provinces and municipalities in China - Chongqing, Guangdong, Jiangsu, Shanghai, Tianjin and Zhejiang - were included then, and Singapore currently continues to admit travellers from these places under the arrangement.
The travellers have to abide by several rules.
Either a company or government agency in Singapore can sponsor or apply for a prospective traveller to visit Singapore at least 14 days before arrival under the reciprocal green lanes.
Approved travellers must take a Covid-19 polymerase chain reaction test within 72 hours before departure for Singapore at an authorised health centre designated by the government of a counterpart country, and obtain a certificate for a negative test.
On arrival in Singapore, these travellers will be swabbed and must test negative once more before they are allowed to proceed with a 14-day itinerary, submitted by their sponsor during the travel application process. They are also required to use TraceTogether during their stay here.
Besides the reciprocal green lanes, Singapore has in place two other travel arrangements for arrivals from several countries and territories.
Separately, the periodic commuting arrangement allows Singapore and Malaysia residents with long-term immigration passes for business and work purposes in the other country to periodically return home for short-term home leave.
An air travel bubble with Hong Kong - which would have facilitated leisure travel between the two places - was slated to launch in November last year but was deferred following a spike in cases in the territory.
