DUNWOODY, Ga. — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta’s northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation’s roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff’s near win in such a district — a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November — encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump’s election. Yet falling short also highlights the party’s lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

“There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he’s ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff’s strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump’s polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she’s asked and even then cautioning she isn’t a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

“I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job … is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that’s what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel’s closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday’s outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign’s closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big ‘R’ win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn’t a “referendum” on the president. He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans — his only path to victory.

“This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi’s “hand-picked” candidate.</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. -- Democrat Jon Ossoff and Republican Karen Handel are headed to a June 20 runoff in the contest for the longtime Republican-held seat in the suburbs north of Atlanta.

But because of technical difficulties in the elections office of Georgia's most populous county, it was not clear when final results in Georgia's 6th Congressional District would be available.

Ossoff had sought to parlay opposition to President Donald Trump into a victory that would rebuke the White House and embolden Democrats ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

With all of the votes counted in Cobb and DeKalb counties and partial returns from Fulton County, Ossoff hovered near the majority threshold required to win an 18-candidate primary outright. Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, was in a distant second, but comfortably ahead of her Republican competitors.

A spokesman for Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp confirmed that Fulton County officials were having difficulty reading memory cards from voting machines. That left uncounted tens of thousands of votes, though Ossoff's support was lagging in Fulton County.

Ossoff addressed his supporters late Tuesday before the runoff was announced.

"No matter what the outcome is tonight, whether we take it all or whether we fight on, we have defied the odds ... shattered expectations," he said.

The winner succeeds Tom Price, who resigned to become Trump's health secretary.

With 185 of 210 precincts reporting, Ossoff had 48 percent of the vote and Handel had 20 percent; Republican Bob Gray was holding the next-highest vote total with 11 percent.

Trump took to Twitter urging Republicans to cast ballots late Tuesday. He even mocked Ossoff's choice of residence -- outside the district.

"Just learned that Jon Ossoff, who is running for Congress in Georgia, doesn't even live in the district. Republicans, get out and vote!" the president wrote.

The contest is testing both parties' strategies for the coming national election cycle. Democrats are expected to have a better shot at snagging the typically Republican seat than they did in last week's closer-than-expected GOP victory in a Kansas special House election.

Trump did not perform as well as other Republicans in November in the Georgia district, an affluent, well-educated area filled with the kind of voters Democrats are likely to need if they hope to reclaim a House majority next year. Republicans currently hold a 238-193 advantage in the chamber.

Ossoff would be a "disaster" in Congress, Trump declared earlier Tuesday on social media, a day after he blasted the "super liberal" Democrat as a champion of criminals, higher taxes and unchecked immigration.

Despite Trump's Twitter barrage, the White House insisted the race isn't about the president. "I wouldn't use the word referendum," said spokesman Sarah Huckabee Sanders. "I think he hopes to have a Republican elected."

An investigative filmmaker, Ossoff raised more than $8.3 million, mostly from donors far from the northern suburbs of Atlanta. That sum dwarfs what any Republican candidate has spent on the contest.

Ossoff has energized liberals and younger voters, while also aiming for disaffected independents and moderate Republicans.

Cedrick Gulley, 25, a Georgia State University student from the Atlanta suburb of Sandy Springs, compared the 30-year-old Ossoff to former President Barack Obama and Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J. Gulley said Tuesday that they all "make me feel like my generation is being heard."

He added that Democrats were "a little lazy" in November, but now "there's an emergence of people fighting."

Ossoff has pledged to fight Trump when he "embarrasses" the country. But he's also said he would "work with anybody in Washington who respects your tax dollars."

That still wasn't enough for voters like Matt West, 45, a financial planner from Roswell.

"He lives outside the district, he's a Democrat, and I just don't believe that he'd stand up to [House Minority Leader] Nancy Pelosi if the district wanted him to," West said. West said he voted for Handel.

Republican groups ran a blitz of ads trying to tie Ossoff to Pelosi; a political action committee backed by House Speaker Paul Ryan has spent more than $2 million on those and other attacks.

As for residency, Ossoff concedes that he lives just south of the district, in Atlanta, so his girlfriend is close to her work at Emory University's medical complex.

National Republicans say any of the four competitive GOP candidates could defeat Ossoff in a second round. They predicted conservative voters would be energized in a Republican vs. Democrat scenario, making it harder for Ossoff.

"Republican voters are not going to sit by and let this district go to a Democrat," Handel said at one of her final campaign stops.

Information for this article was contributed by Catherine Lucey of The Associated Press.</s>Two weeks before a special election for Georgia’s Sixth Congressional District seat, which takes place this Tuesday, the thirty-year-old Democratic candidate Jon Ossoff stood on a busy North Atlanta street corner brandishing a lightsaber. His combatant was a giggling eight-year-old boy who didn’t grasp the broader sabering context: soon after Ossoff declared his candidacy to replace Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tom Price, in January, an odd attack ad appeared, showing Ossoff, in his Georgetown days, dressed as Han Solo from “Star Wars,” for a spoof film made by Ossoff’s college a-cappella group. Paid for by the Congressional Leadership Fund, the ad was presumably meant to portray Ossoff, who most recently worked as a documentary filmmaker exposing judicial corruption and wartime atrocities, as young, unserious, and . . . a leader in the alliance to restore the Republic? Somehow, the ad did little to dissuade voters from considering the political novice: in the weeks since, he has risen to the head of an eighteen-candidate pack, garnering forty-five per cent of the vote in a poll released this past Friday.

As Ossoff and his eight-year-old foe performed their roadside lightsaber act, dozens of supporters raised handwritten signs, many of which read, “ ” Cars honked approval as they passed. A line cook from a nearby Waffle House appeared, in his apron, offering “free waffles to Ossoff voters!” (It was unclear whether the offer had his bosses’ approval, but the cook’s support was noted.) At one point, Ossoff’s chief Republican rival, Karen Handel, a former Secretary of State in Georgia who has also run, unsuccessfully, for the Republican nominations for governor and senator, drove by and stopped for a red light. A volunteer for Ossoff, not recognizing her, asked for her support. “I’ll be voting for myself,” Handel reportedly said.

Handel has the lead among the Republicans in the race, at between seventeen and twenty-one per cent, according to the latest polls. On Tuesday, Democrats, Republicans, and independents will all appear on one ballot. Unless one candidate captures a full fifty per cent of the vote, there will be a runoff between the top two finishers, on June 20th. Ossoff’s overall polling lead is formidable, but it also reflects a crowded conservative field that features pro-Trump Republicans, establishment Republicans, at least one vocally anti-Trump Republican, and a John Wayne-quoting Muslim Republican named Mohammad Ali Bhuiyan. Their résumés are just as varied: at a nonpartisan candidate forum and luncheon in late March, Handel and Ossoff were joined onstage by a former flight attendant, a Georgia State University Italian professor, a cardiologist, the Trump campaign’s “diversity chief,” and twelve others. Ossoff sat in the middle, looking not unlike a diligent schoolboy surrounded by disgruntled principals.

“If I had to put money on it, I’d say Ossoff is headed for a runoff against Karen Handel,” Jim Galloway, a longtime political columnist for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, told me. She would be poised to become the first female Republican member of Congress from Georgia. “Ossoff is going to look for the support of college-educated women and independents,” Galloway said. “And they’re not going to be turned off by Handel.” Galloway said that he would be “mildly surprised” if Ossoff won outright on Tuesday.

At the forum, Handel—who is also the author of a book, “Planned Bullyhood,” about her time at the breast-cancer charity Susan G. Komen for the Cure and the organization’s relationship to Planned Parenthood—made her case for reducing corporate taxes and repealing Obamacare. Ossoff, meanwhile, said that he would seek to help improve Obamacare and generally delivered a fairly traditional Democratic message, with a dose of fiscal conservatism. “A country says a lot about its values and priorities in how it balances its books,” he said. “And, as we seek to achieve fiscal responsibility, to do so on the backs of folks who have no voice—low-income children or seniors—I think reflects the wrong set of priorities.” The Georgia Sixth, which is about seventy per cent white, is one of the wealthiest districts in the country.

Trump’s name rarely came up during the two-hour forum, though he loomed over everything. (Bruce LeVell, Trump’s diversity chief during the campaign, broke from the pack by invoking him explicitly, and approvingly: “I know Trump well,” he said, “and will help achieve his goals.”) Voters in the area tend to be less circumspect. When I walked around the district with Ossoff six weeks ago, it was clear that, while many voters didn’t know who Ossoff was or what, exactly, he stood for, they were certain in their dislike for Trump—and ready to vote for any reasonable candidate who would, to use one of Ossoff’s campaign slogans, “make Trump furious.” Back then, Ossoff insisted to me that he was focussed on local issues, not national politics. But he has kept up a steady beat of Trump criticism in his advertising. In one of his TV spots currently flooding Atlanta’s airwaves, Ossoff says, of the President, “He’s not only embarrassing us on the world stage—he could start an unnecessary war.”

Ossoff can afford to blanket local television in part thanks to the millions of dollars that have poured into his campaign from individual donors all over the country. Dozens of volunteers from outside the state have also come to Georgia to spread his message. Ossoff recently landed on the cover of New York magazine, which called him “The Trump-Hate Weather Vane,” and stories have also appeared in Time and The Atlantic. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has put ads on Atlanta radio featuring the actor Samuel L. Jackson, a Morehouse alum. (“We have to channel the great vengeance and furious anger we have for this Administration into votes at the ballot box,” Jackson says in the spot.) Meanwhile, the actress Alyssa Milano, currently filming a project in Atlanta, drove Ossoff supporters to vote early during her downtime. The band Imagine Dragons has given the campaign permission to use one of its songs—its drummer, Daniel Platzman, was in Ossoff’s high-school class—though it hasn’t appeared in an ad yet.

That kind of national, Hollywood attention may have a mixed effect. In another special election, Republicans held onto a contested congressional seat in Kansas when the state treasurer Ron Estes beat the Democratic political newcomer and civil-rights lawyer James Thompson by just seven points. Thompson, unlike Ossoff, had just a few hundred thousand dollars at his campaign’s disposal, and tougher math to deal with: Trump had won Kansas’s Fourth District by twenty-seven points in November, while the President only took Georgia’s Sixth by one. But some observers have argued that the absence of outsiders meddling in the Kansas election may have actually helped Thompson, who concentrated much of his criticism on Kansas’s unpopular Republican governor, Sam Brownback. After the race, Thompson credited Trump with securing his opponent’s victory. (On Sunday night, Trump tweeted, “The recent Kansas election (Congress) was a really big media event, until the Republicans won. Now they play the same game with Georgia-BAD!”)

Few of the Republicans in the Georgia race have loudly embraced the President. But just one of the eleven, the local energy entrepreneur David Abroms, who has been polling below two per cent, has disclosed that he voted for someone other than Trump last November. (He opted for the independent candidate Evan McMullin.) Abroms was also the only Republican candidate to object when another anti-Ossoff ad recently tried to make hay of the fact that Ossoff’s documentary production company has done work for the television network Al Jazeera, which the ad called “a mouthpiece for terrorists.” It went on, about Ossoff, “What is he hiding, and how can we trust him?” Republicans have also raised the issue of trust by suggesting, more plausibly, that Ossoff may have overstated the extent of his national-security experience as a staffer with Democratic Representative Hank Johnson. (Johnson and his former chief of staff have defended Ossoff’s characterization of his work.)

So far, at least, the Al Jazeera ad doesn’t appear to have hurt Ossoff any more than the “Star Wars” spot did. On that street corner earlier this month, when the lightsabering had ceased, and just a few minutes before Ossoff left for another rally in a different part of the district, a man who looked roughly Ossoff’s age walked up to the crowd. He wore a baseball cap and a Selena Gomez T-shirt. “Scott!” Ossoff exclaimed, recognizing an old a-cappella buddy. Ossoff turned back to the small crowd, smiling. “Scott played Vader in . . . the film,” he said. I chatted with Scott, who now works in insurance and had happened to be driving by the rally, before he left. “You put a Darth Vader mask on one time,” he said, “and this is what happens!”</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta’s northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation’s roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff’s near win in such a district — a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November — encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump’s election. Yet falling short also highlights the party’s lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

“There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he’s ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff’s strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump’s polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she’s asked and even then cautioning she isn’t a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

“I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job … is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that’s what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel’s closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday’s outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign’s closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big `R’ win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn’t a “referendum” on the president.

He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans — his only path to victory.

“This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi’s “hand-picked” candidate.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. (AP) - A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia's 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump's administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta's northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation's roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff's near win in such a district - a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November - encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump's election. Yet falling short also highlights the party's lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

"There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages," Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he's ready for more. "Bring it on!" he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff's strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump's polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she's asked and even then cautioning she isn't a "rubber stamp" for anyone.

"I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree," Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. "But my job ... is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that's what I believe regardless of who is the president."

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel's closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday's outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending "career politician."

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. "There will certainly be a clear contrast," Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign's closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: "Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big 'R' win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!"

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn't a "referendum" on the president. He just "hopes to have a Republican elected," Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans - his only path to victory.

"This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history," he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about "the kind of country" the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi's "hand-picked" candidate.</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta’s northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation’s roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff’s near win in such a district — a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November — encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump’s election. Yet falling short also highlights the party’s lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

“There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he’s ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff’s strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump’s polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she’s asked and even then cautioning she isn’t a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

“I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job … is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that’s what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel’s closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday’s outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign’s closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big `R’ win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn’t a “referendum” on the president. He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans — his only path to victory.

“This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi’s “hand-picked” candidate.</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta’s northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation’s roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff’s near win in such a district — a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November — encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump’s election. Yet falling short also highlights the party’s lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

“There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he’s ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff’s strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump’s polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she’s asked and even then cautioning she isn’t a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

“I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job … is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that’s what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel’s closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday’s outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign’s closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big ‘R’ win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn’t a “referendum” on the president. He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans — his only path to victory.

“This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi’s “hand-picked” candidate.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta’s northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation’s roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff’s near win in such a district — a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November — encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump’s election. Yet falling short also highlights the party’s lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

“There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he’s ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff’s strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump’s polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she’s asked and even then cautioning she isn’t a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

“I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job … is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that’s what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel’s closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday’s outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign’s closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big ‘R’ win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn’t a “referendum” on the president. He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans — his only path to victory.

“This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi’s “hand-picked” candidate.</s>DUNWOODY, Ga. (AP) — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

 Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

 The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump’s administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta’s northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation’s roiled political atmosphere.

 Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

 For Democrats, Ossoff’s near win in such a district — a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November — encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump’s election. Yet falling short also highlights the party’s lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

 “There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

 Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he’s ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

 For Republicans, Ossoff’s strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump’s polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

 Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she’s asked and even then cautioning she isn’t a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

 “I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job … is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that’s what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

 That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel’s closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

 The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday’s outcome in their favor.

 Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

 Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

 Trump, who took to social media in the campaign’s closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big ‘R’ win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

 In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

 As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn’t a “referendum” on the president. He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

 Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans — his only path to victory.

 “This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

 Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

 A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

 Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi’s “hand-picked” candidate.

 ___

 Follow Barrow on Twitter at https://twitter.com/BillBarrowAP .</s>Sign up for one of our email newsletters.

DUNWOODY, Ga. — A Georgia congressional election in a historically conservative district is headed to a runoff that raises the stakes in an early measure for President Donald Trump and both major parties ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old former congressional staffer, fell a few percentage points shy of an outright victory amid an 18-candidate scramble in Georgia's 6th Congressional District. Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state, finished a distant second, qualifying for the June 20 runoff.

The winner will succeed Republican Tom Price, who resigned the seat to join Trump's administration as health secretary. But the matchup in greater Atlanta's northern suburbs is just as much about Ossoff and Handel acting as proxies for the nation's roiled political atmosphere.

Leaders in both major parties agree the race offers a prime test run for 2018 elections, because the affluent, well-educated Georgia district is replete with the kind of voters Democrats must attract to reclaim a House majority and win more gubernatorial and Senate races.

For Democrats, Ossoff's near win in such a district - a Republican has held the seat since 1979, and Price won 62 percent of the vote in November - encourages the opposition movement that has flourished since Trump's election. Yet falling short also highlights the party's lingering power deficit in Washington and around the country.

“There is no doubt this is already a victory for the ages,” Ossoff told his supporters, praising them for a campaign that has collected more than $8.3 million, most of it from well beyond Georgia.

Having already endured several million in attacks from national Republican outfits, Ossoff said he's ready for more. “Bring it on!” he said.

For Republicans, Ossoff's strong performance acts as another wake-up call alongside a closer-than-expected win in a House special election last week in arch-conservative Kansas. It also serves notice that GOP candidates may always struggle to handle Trump's polarizing effects; he engenders an intense loyalty among his core supporters but alienates many independents and even Republicans.

Handel has treated Trump gingerly throughout, rarely mentioning him unless she's asked and even then cautioning she isn't a “rubber stamp” for anyone.

“I certainly support the president and will work with him where we agree,” Handel told The Associated Press at one of her final campaign stops before polls opened. “But my job ... is to be the representative for the people of the 6th District, and that's what I believe regardless of who is the president.”

That distinguished her from other Republican contenders she left to squabble over who is more loyal to Trump. One of Handel's closest competitors, technology executive Bob Gray, even donned hip waders for one television spot as he paid homage to the president by, literally, draining a swamp.

The campaigns, advocacy groups and even the president himself moved quickly to frame Tuesday's outcome in their favor.

Handel began to consolidate a fractured party. She trailed Ossoff by more than a 2-to-1 margin, but drew immediate endorsements from some of her fellow GOP candidates and national party leaders, including House Speaker Paul Ryan. She did not immediately get a nod from the conservative Club for Growth, a Washington organization that spent six figures attacking her as a big-spending “career politician.”

Republicans believe a two-candidate scenario will embolden conservative voters and make it harder for Ossoff to campaign above the fray as he has thus far. “There will certainly be a clear contrast,” Handel told AP.

Trump, who took to social media in the campaign's closing days to heckle Ossoff and encourage Republicans, crowed on his personal Twitter account: “Despite major outside money, FAKE media support and eleven Republican candidates, Big ‘R' win with runoff in Georgia. Glad to be of help!”

In fact, Trump gave Ossoff his opening in the first place. The president barely edged Hillary Clinton here in November, falling short of a majority four years after Republican Mitt Romney got more than 60 percent of the presidential vote.

As Trump carried out his Twitter barrage against Ossoff earlier Tuesday, a White House spokeswoman insisted the race wasn't a “referendum” on the president. He just “hopes to have a Republican elected,” Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.

Ossoff has capitalized on anti-Trump energy while still trying to appeal to independents and moderate Republicans - his only path to victory.

“This is not a story about me. This is a story about this community at this moment in history,” he said Tuesday night, casting the race as a choice about “the kind of country” the United States will be, though he never named Trump.

Republicans have made their own attempts at nationalizing the campaign.

A political action committee backed by Ryan and other House GOP leaders funneled more than $2 million into attacks on Ossoff, tying him to national Democrats like House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The California Democrat remains an unpopular figure in the district.

Handel spends most of her efforts touting her record in public office, but makes a point to join in the Pelosi bashing. Ossoff, she says, is Pelosi's “hand-picked” candidate.
Democratic candidates face off with Republican candidates in a primary for a U.S. House seat vacated by Tom Price, now Health and Human Services Secretary, in a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia.