We’re making sense of the midterms. Subscribe to our daily newsletter for election context and analysis.

ATLANTA — Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has won reelection, Decision Desk HQ projects, defeating Stacey Abrams in one of the most closely watched races in the country.

Kemp, the incumbent Republican, surpassed 50 percent of the votes in Tuesday’s election, avoiding a runoff. It was a repeat matchup from four years ago, when Kemp bested Abrams by 55,000 votes, or just 1.4 percentage points.

Abrams thanked supporters gathered at a downtown Atlanta hotel for her election night party, appearing shortly before midnight.

“While I may not have crossed the finish line, that does not mean we will ever stop running for a better Georgia,” she said to applause.

Abrams had been on the cusp of history. Voters have never elected a Black woman governor in the country. Abrams has been one of the most prolific fundraisers, which allowed her to be competitive throughout the election cycle with television ads and campaign outreach. Political observers had pointed to her bid as the most likely to break through in a year where several Black women sought the office around the country.

But Abrams had new challenges compared with four years ago. She faced an incumbent instead of running for an open seat, in an election year where Democrats had been facing headwinds around the country — the president’s party historically performs poorly in midterm elections. President Joe Biden has been polling unfavorably amid record inflation.

Abrams, a longtime voting rights advocate, tried to persuade more voters to show up to the polls, outreach that is credited with helping Democrats in 2020 and 2021. But while Georgians showed up in record numbers in early voting, turnout boosted by the organizing of Black women, it wasn’t enough.

At the Atlanta hotel where Abrams held her election night party, a lively group was gathered for hours, at times joyously dancing as they waited for results.

Time seemed suspended after Kemp was announced the projected winner by Decision Desk HQ. The crowd remained upbeat for at least another hour. But as the night progressed, more people appeared glued to their phones looking for signs of optimism. One woman had her hands on her face, looking at the large screen showing results from around the country. It occasionally showed incoming results for Georgia.

Danielle Drummond, 23, an organizer with the group Progress Georgia, had come out to support Abrams. As the night wore on, she noted: “It’s feeling a little hopeless.”

When Abrams appeared, she told her election party that she had conceded to Kemp, something she did not do in 2018. Throughout her second bid, she defended that decision and said it was not something to conflate with former President Donald Trump’s actions around election denialism.

Maria Todd, a 28-year-old who works in marketing, was at the election night party and said she voted for Abrams because of her support for abortion access.

“I’m definitely disappointed,” she said. “I thought she was the best choice for Georgia, because she represented all of Georgia.”

Kemp leaned heavily on his record to persuade voters to give him another chance. That meant highlighting work to keep businesses and schools open during the early months of the pandemic, moves that at the time were heavily criticized because of the still-unfolding pandemic. He’s also highlighted a record low unemployment rate in the state.

“That’s what this race is about,” he told a small restaurant crowd eating breakfast in Jefferson on Friday. “Is, ‘Who’s going to keep fighting for you in the future?’”

Asked why he was convinced the economy would be a winning message, Kemp told The 19th: “Well that’s what people are talking to me about. People thank me for keeping our economy open and our state, literally every single day.”

That message resonated with Michelle Holmes, 52, who owns a nearby pet grooming service. She ordered an egg and cheese sandwich to go after the event.

Holmes said she worried about how to pay her handful of employees during the early weeks of the pandemic.

“For Kemp to turn around and reopen things, that pretty much saved my business,” she said.

Kemp also highlighted the legislature’s work to suspend the state’s gasoline tax amid high rising prices. For JoAn Clyde, who saw Kemp speak at another stop in Madison, those efforts have been important with rising expenses on food.

“This economy is on everyone’s mind right now,” she said.

Still, the result signifies a deeply divided state. The work ahead for Kemp includes addressing the concerns of people who did not vote for him. Abrams signs littered some of the most populous areas of the state, including metro Atlanta.

Lisa Dancy, 55, who voted early for Abrams and also voted for Abrams in 2018, said she is concerned about health care access. She mentioned the closing of rural hospitals in the state, and the closing of a hospital in Georgia recently. She noted people have to travel a long distance to get care.

Dancy said she is also concerned about the high costs of goods and services right now. But when she heard Kemp’s supporters were pointing to that as their reason for supporting him, she said it was up to the White House and Congress to address it.

“I’m not sure what a governor can do about it,” she said, adding: “It’s a way to distract voters.”

Lisa Harper, who drove in from McDonough to see Abrams in Atlanta, said gun violence and the abortion access were top issues for her. The 42-year-old, who works in sales, voted early for Abrams. She said if Kemp won the election, she would still want him to address these issues.

“You’re losing restrictions on one thing, almost to the point of it being chaotic and dangerous — and then tightening restrictions to the point that it becomes chaotic and dangerous for another group of people,” she said. “It’s a juxtaposition that I don’t understand.”

Todd said she plans to support Abrams in the future, noting that at 48, she still has a potentially long future in politics.

“She’s still young in the world of politics,” Todd said. “You never know what’s to come next.”