(CNN) Georgia is on every political junkie's mind in the lead up to the state's two Senate runoffs on January 5.
The stakes could not be any higher, as Democrats need to win both seats to force a 50-50 Senate and gain control with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris eventually casting the tie breaking vote.
To win, Democrats will need to break historical precedent. But with the elections just a few weeks away, these races remain way too close to call.
That's a bit surprising because Republicans entered the runoffs as slight favorites.
Republican Senate candidates actually got more votes in both races in November. Sen. David Perdue received 49.7% of the vote, falling just short of a majority needed to win outright. Democrat Jon Ossoff came in with 48.0%, or nearly 90,000 votes behind Perdue.
The state's special Senate election doesn't follow as neat a script, though the outcome was similar. In the special election, there were no party primaries. All the Democrats and Republicans ran in one election, and the two top vote-getters (Democrat Raphael Warnock and Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler) advanced to the runoff.
When you tally up all the Democratic and Republican votes, the Republican candidates got 49.4%. The Democrats got 48.4%, or nearly 50,000 votes behind the Republicans.
To win either or both races, Democrats need either to get Republican voters in November to vote for the Democrats in January, win the bulk of November third party voters or hope for a change in the relative voter turnout between Democrats and Republicans.
Historically, Republicans have improved upon their November performance in Georgia statewide runoffs traditionally. In seven of eight statewide runoffs since 1992, Republican candidates have gained ground in the runoff relative to the Democratic candidates.
The polling though suggests that history may not hold. Both races are within a point or two either way. And although that's far from conclusive in telling us who will win, the polls are inconsistent with the idea that Republicans have gained a lot of ground since the November elections.
Indeed, the turnout in early voting (both by mail and in-person) is sympatico with the polling of the races being close like November. That is, there are no indications from who is turning out that one side has a turnout advantage relative to what we saw in November.
Perhaps it shouldn't be too shocking if Republicans don't benefit from their usual turnout advantage in Georgia runoffs.
Unlike most runoffs, this one has national implications. It's for control of the Senate. You have national figures including President Donald Trump and President-elect Joe Biden visiting the state.
We also don't know how Trump's false charges of voter fraud in Georgia -- a state that went for a Democrat in the presidential election for the first time in 28 years -- could affect turnout.
Moreover, Trump's emergence on the national stage has changed who is a Democratic voter in Georgia. While the base of the Democratic Party in the state is still African Americans, college-educated White Georgians have become much more Democratic over the last decade.
Biden's greatest gains compared to 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton in Georgia, for instance, were in precincts that were college-educated and suburban. They were small to non-existent in majority Black and urban areas.
Georgia's 6th congressional district was ground zero for these Democratic advances. It's in the Atlanta suburbs and has one of the highest percentages of college-educated adults in the country.
Biden won it by 11 points, after Clinton lost it by 2 points and Barack Obama lost it by 23 points in 2012. No other Georgia congressional district moved that much to the left in the last eight years.
Importantly, white college-educated voters are among the highest turnout groups in the country. They're less likely to drop off from the November election to the January runoffs.
White college-educated voters are also the voters that Ossoff and Warnock want to improve most among to win the runoff.
Generally, the Senate Democratic candidates ran behind Biden in different parts of Georgia.
They ran behind most, though, in the 6th congressional district. Biden won it by 11, while the Democrats outran the Republicans by 6 points and 5 points in the special and regular November Senate elections.
This leaves us with a big question. Will the Republicans who became anti-Trump Republican Senate voters in the 6th district still vote for Perdue and Loeffler in January?
It seems plausible that the last couple months could have made an impact on their vote. We just don't know at this point, however.
If these anti-Trump Senate Republican voters don't change their minds, Republicans will likely maintain control of the Senate.
If they do in large enough numbers, Georgia could give Democrats control of the Senate.