Grammy-winning singer Patti Austin has made a bid to get out the vote in Georgia with a new song posted by the political action committee MeidasTouch.
The runoff vote, which takes place on Jan. 5, could determine whether or not the Senate goes Democrat or Republican Mitch McConnell remains majority leader.
“I know you’ve gotta be tired of washing hands and wearing masks/ But you can save the planet’s ass!,” Austin sings in the big-band spoofing song.
“Georgia, we’re all waiting to see/ If you’ve left the Confederacy,” she continues. “Well, welcome to the 21 st century!”
As the song winds down, she vamps, “QAnon conspiracies, vote that crap away from me!”
So honored to have Grammy award-winning singer @pattiaustin join MediasTouch to release her new song ‘Georgia Ur Votin 4ME2’ promoting a record voter turnout in Georgia 🎶 🎶 pic.twitter.com/iaQ1yXBRjR
— MeidasTouch.com (@MeidasTouch) December 17, 2020
The historic November vote in Georgia played a major role in electing Joe Biden president — the state had not gone for a Democratic presidential nominee since Bill Clinton in 1992. Biden collected the state’s 16 electoral votes, besting Donald Trump by 12,670 votes.
Progressives are holding their breath to see if Georgia can complete its leftward turn in a runoff election that will determine control of the U.S. Senate. Democrats Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock are facing an uphill battle against incumbents David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, both of whom are accused of insider trading.
“The entertainment industry will play a key role to delivering Georgia for Democrats or keeping it under Republican control,” Democratic consultant Fred Hicks told Variety last month.
But with the presidential election going for the Democrats while the majority of the state government’s power is held by Republicans, said Audrey Haynes, associate professor of political science at the University of Georgia, Georgia is effectively a purple state.
“A state becomes bluer in a lot of different ways; we don’t know exactly what the tipping point was,” she says. “But we are purpling because of a variety of things. Part of that is the fact that you have these new businesses [that] are coming in and it’s keeping younger people in the state. And the movie industry is something that keeps younger people here too.”
One example of cutting through that noise came when Abrams appeared during the Verzuz streaming battle between Atlanta rappers Gucci Mane and Jeezy on Nov. 19. Kicking off the livestream with her cameo, political activist and Fair Fight Action founder Stacey Abrams encouraged the 1.8 million viewers to affirm their voter registration for the Georgia Senate runoff election on Jan. 5.