Barack Obama went to the mattresses trying to save Kamala Harris in 2024.
He just tried to make another power play in the Democrat Party.
But what voters told him just confirmed this grim reality about his political future.
Obama Endorsement Fails as Georgia Supreme Court Rejects Jen Jordan and Miracle Rankin
George Democrat Supreme Court Justice Jen Jordan and Miracle Rankin ran with the full weight of the Democrat establishment behind them.
Barack Obama and Kamala Harris endorsed them both. The Democrat Party of Georgia threw its machinery behind a campaign to flip two seats on the Georgia Supreme Court – seats that would have mattered enormously in the redistricting fights heading into 2028.
Justice Sarah Warren beat Jordan by roughly 19 percentage points.
Justice Charlie Bethel beat Rankin – the closer race – by about 2 points after a Fulton County polling delay pushed the final call past midnight.
The races were officially nonpartisan – no party labels on the ballot – and more voters cast ballots in the Democrat primary than the Republican primary on Tuesday.
Democrats have the perfect political environment to flip those seats and the candidates had the backing of Obama to draw attention to these often overlooked races.
No incumbent justice on the Georgia Supreme Court had lost a reelection bid in 104 years, and Obama's endorsement couldn't move a race with that kind of institutional gravity working in his favor.
Democrats also had a federal judge – Stacey Abrams' sister – issue an order blocking a state judicial ethics panel from releasing findings that Jordan and Rankin had violated conduct rules by endorsing each other and promising to restore abortion rights on a court where the issue was already pending.
The 11th Circuit overruled that order the day before the election and authorized publication anyway.
Voters saw it. It didn't help.
Georgia Redistricting 2026 Now Stays in Republican Hands Through 2028
Democrats needed this court.
Governor Brian Kemp has called for a special redistricting session that could reduce the number of majority-black congressional districts in Georgia – a case almost certain to reach the state Supreme Court.
Republicans hold eight of nine seats on that bench.
Obama put his name on both candidates, and the losses guarantee the court stays in conservative hands through 2028, when three more Republican-appointed justices face reelection.
Earlier this month, the Virginia Supreme Court threw out a Democrat gerrymandering scheme Obama had backed – a plan engineered to hand Democrats 10 of Virginia's 11 congressional districts – ruling it illegal on May 8th.
Obama backed that effort too, and it collapsed the same week he went 0-for-2 in Georgia.
Obama Stumped for Kamala Harris in Every Swing State and Lost Them All
Barack and Michelle Obama hit the trail hard for Kamala Harris in the final stretch of 2024.
Barack stumped in Pennsylvania. Michelle appeared before a crowd in Kalamazoo, told them she was "a little angry" at voter hesitation, and made a direct appeal to black men and young voters to turn out for Harris.
Trump won Pennsylvania. Trump won Michigan. Trump won every swing state and the popular vote.
Working-class voters told the story in the exit numbers.
Trump took 62 percent of voters with a high school education or less – a 16-point jump from 2012. He won 51 percent of households earning under $100,000. He hit 45 percent with union households, five points above Mitt Romney's 2012 performance.
Harris carried just 48 percent of voters earning under $50,000 – nine points worse than Biden's 2020 performance with the same group.
Obama was on stage. The voters weren't listening.
Barack Obama Endorsement Record Shows a Pattern Democrats Keep Ignoring
Trump endorsements move Republican primaries in measurable ways.
Candidates reshape their entire campaigns around securing his backing because GOP base voters follow through.
Obama's endorsements generate press releases, raise money from people who already donate, and produce zero measurable shift in the voters he's supposed to move.
In 2010 and 2014, Democrats lost the House and then the Senate while Obama campaigned aggressively for his party.
In 2022, Obama endorsed more than 300 candidates heading into midterms where Republicans flipped the House anyway.
The donor class keeps booking him. The voters keep shrugging.
Georgia wasn't a surprise.
It was confirmation – 104 years of incumbent judicial history working in Democrats' favor, Obama's endorsement stacked on top, Kamala Harris's endorsement stacked on top of that, a favorable primary electorate, and a federal judge blocking damaging ethics findings on the way to the polls.
None of it delivered two Georgia Supreme Court seats Democrats needed for the redistricting fights ahead.
Barack Obama is a spent force – and Georgia just made it official.
Sources:
- "Conservative incumbents defend seats on Georgia Supreme Court," CNN, May 19, 2026.
- "GOP-Backed Justices Prevail in Georgia in Unusually Spirited Supreme Court Elections," Bolts, May 20, 2026.
- "Conservative Candidates Sweep Georgia Supreme Court Elections," The Federalist, May 20, 2026.
- "Dem-backed state Supreme Court candidates lose critical Georgia race," Democracy Docket, May 20, 2026.
- "How Kamala Harris Lost the 2024 Election," Time, November 6, 2024.
