--- title: Georgia Special Election: Karen Handel Won Bigger Than Trump description: Not only did Republican Karen Handel survive any anti-Trump sentiment among voters - she actually outperformed him in the district. canonical: https://time.com/4826293/georgia-election-results-karen-handel-map/ author: Chris Wilson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-06-21T14:18:47.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:58:44.834Z article:section: Politics og:title: Karen Handel’s Victory in Georgia Was Bigger Than Trump’s og:description: She actually outperformed him in the district. og:url: https://time.com/4826293/georgia-election-results-karen-handel-map/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt388464627a13addf/6988d289196cf46a70040b19/karen-handel.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3600 og:image:height: 2025 og:image:alt: GOP GA Congressional Candidate Karen Handel Holds Election Night Event og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Karen Handel’s Victory in Georgia Was Bigger Than Trump’s twitter:description: She actually outperformed him in the district. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt388464627a13addf/6988d289196cf46a70040b19/karen-handel.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Karen Handel’s Victory in Georgia Was Bigger Than Trump’s > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters.  by [Chris Wilson](https://time.com/author/chris-wilson/)  ## Chris Wilson Jun 21, 2017 2:18 PM UTC  Karen Handel gives a victory speech to supporters gathered at the Hyatt Regency at Villa Christina on June 20, 2017 in Atlanta, GA. Karen Handel gives a victory speech to supporters gathered at the Hyatt Regency at Villa Christina on June 20, 2017 in Atlanta, GA. Jessica McGowan—Getty Images  by [Chris Wilson](https://time.com/author/chris-wilson/)  ## Chris Wilson Jun 21, 2017 2:18 PM UTC After a deeply disappointing loss in Georgia’s special election, Democrats are hoping that Jon Ossoff’s narrow defeat in a staunchly conservative district is the harbinger of a shifting tide. “This is the beginning of something much bigger than us,” [Ossoff said](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/20/us/politics/karen-handel-georgia-special-election.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=photo-spot-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&%5Fr=0) in his concession speech. And even though they avoided an embarrassing upset, some Republicans were still biting their nails after all the returns were in. “This could be a very bad sign of things to come,” an adviser to [House Speaker Paul Ryan told TIME](http://time.com/4826062/georgia-election-results-karen-handel/?xid=homepage). But not only did Republican Karen Handel survive any anti-Trump sentiment among voters — she actually outperformed him in the district. With all 208 precincts reporting, [Handel won with 51.87% ](http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/GA/70059/Web02-state/#/)of the vote in the head-to-head contest. A TIME analysis of the 2016 election results in those exact same precincts found that Trump only captured 50.44% of the vote to Hillary Clinton’s 49.56% when one discounts third-party candidates and write-ins. (Some election counters put Trump’s margin of victory in the district at [closer to 1.5 points](https://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/11/19/1163009/-Daily-Kos-Elections-presidential-results-by-congressional-district-for-the-2012-2008-elections), which is likely due to discrepancies in which precincts were open Tuesday. That margin is still less than half of Handel’s 3.7 point lead.) If anything, the biggest lesson from Tuesday night is that voters are getting even more polarized. The following map shows which precincts voted more Democratic (blue) or Republican (red) between 2016 and Tuesday’s election. Far from a tide of voters abandoning the party of an [unpopular president](http://time.com/4751112/trump-100-days-polling-approval-rating/), the precincts were almost exactly split between shifting one way or the other, with 102 getting more blue and 106 going more red.  In most cases, the shifts were slight enough not to indicate any major change in the voting composition of Georgia’s 6th district. Handel won only 6 precincts that went for Clinton, while Ossoff picked up only 3 from Trump. The biggest difference, in fact, was that, like most congressional races, Tuesday’s contest saw a much lower turnout than one typically sees in a presidential race. Last November, [76.5% of registered voters in Georgia](http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/GA/63991/184321/en/summary.html) showed up at the polls, and that figure was even higher in the 6th district, where turnout was 81.2% in the fall. By contrast, even with [record-breaking spending of over $50 million](http://politics.blog.ajc.com/2017/06/19/the-race-for-georgias-6th-district-now-costs-more-than-50m/) on the race, only 58% of registered voters were motivated to cast a ballot in the special election. There are just over 500 days until the 2018 midterm elections, during which time the political landscape will undulate repeatedly. Those who hoped or feared that Tuesday night would be a bellwether for the midterm elections can either shelve their disappointment or ease up on their relief. It takes more than 152 days to upend the American electorate. _See the_ [_data for both 2016 and the special election_](https://github.com/TimeMagazine/georgia-special-election) _on TIME Labs’ Github page._ ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4826293/georgia-election-results-karen-handel-map/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4826293/georgia-election-results-karen-handel-map/"},"headline":"Karen Handel’s Victory in Georgia Was Bigger Than Trump’s","datePublished":"2017-06-21T14:18:47.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:58:44.834Z","description":"She actually outperformed him in the district","url":"https://time.com/4826293/georgia-election-results-karen-handel-map/","keywords":["elections","Voting","georgia","interactive studio"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt388464627a13addf/6988d289196cf46a70040b19/karen-handel.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Chris Wilson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/chris-wilson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt388464627a13addf/6988d289196cf46a70040b19/karen-handel.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"GOP GA Congressional Candidate Karen Handel Holds Election Night Event","caption":"GOP GA Congressional Candidate Karen Handel Holds Election Night Event","creditText":"Jessica McGowan—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/elections/","name":"elections"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4826293/georgia-election-results-karen-handel-map/","name":"Karen Handel’s Victory in Georgia Was Bigger Than Trump’s"}}]}] ```