Former Senator David Perdue (R-GA) seems to be quite the weak man, doesn’t he? Consider this little history of him moving from not wanting to run for Governor of Georgia to, well, running:
Republican David Perdue traveled to Donald Trump’s Florida golf club, Mar-a-Lago, in February with his mind made up: He did not want to run for Georgia governor against his longtime friend, incumbent Brian Kemp, he told associates.
But Trump, still fuming that Kemp had certified Joe Biden’s victory in the state last year, had other ideas. The former president played two rounds of golf that day with Perdue, part of a relentless campaign to persuade the former U.S. senator to jump in the race, according to two people familiar with his efforts who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations. …
Perdue ultimately relented, announcing Monday that he would challenge Kemp for the Republican gubernatorial nomination because, he said, he does not believe the incumbent can win against presumed Democratic nominee Stacey Abrams. His decision guarantees a bitter intraparty fight and keeps at center stage Trump’s false claims that the 2020 vote was stolen — two factors that many Republicans say will make it harder for them to win in the fall. [WaPo]
This is perturbing for both parties, as the Democrats scent blood in the water, and the Republicans are anticipating a bit of a bleed out. Here’s a fuming Erick Erickson, who fears he’s watching his imminent Victory For Republicans celebration go up in smoke:
This divides the Georgia Republicans and gives Abrams clear sailing. It hurts Kemp’s fundraising and helps Abrams’ fundraising. Perdue’s entire campaign will be about Trump’s grievance over 2020 and his sales pitch will be that Kemp should have called a special election to overturn the lawful results of Georgia’s election — which, had Kemp done, would have still not stopped Biden in the Electoral College.
David Perdue is a fine man. I really do like him. But he hates the grind of campaigning and it showed this last time. He’s not good on a debate stage and it showed last time. He’s been beaten by one of the least accomplished Democrats and wants to run against the Abrams machine. Instead of being his own man, he’ll just be a tool through which Trump nurses a grudge.
The primary still favors Brian Kemp. Kemp does not have the GOP locked down. He does have problems and his team needs to recognize those problems. But Kemp does have a legislative session to try to get more done on which to run while Perdue will either have to undermine the agenda as Abrams wants or sit by and watch Kemp build accomplishments.
Abrams is the only winner in this move and it makes Abrams more likely to win even as the headwinds blow against the left. It is unfortunate. But the Mara Lago echo chamber rivals the voices in Jen Rubin’s head.
Erickson’s based in Georgia, so he probably knows what he’s talking about. But notice that he accuses Perdue of not being his own man, of, by implication, being weak. Perdue will be the fire hose through which Trump shrieks his accusations and lies. Or here’s Steve Benen highlighting Perdue’s weakness:
Specifically on the issue on whether he would’ve certified his own state’s election results, Perdue said yesterday, “Not with the information that was available at the time and not with the information that has come out now. They had plenty of time to investigate this. And I wouldn’t have signed it until those things had been investigated, and that’s all we were asking for.”
Right off the bat, let’s note for emphasis that there was nothing wrong with Georgia’s election results. There was no evidence of systemic fraud, no evidence of irregularities, and literally no reason to question the validity of the state’s ballot count and recount. President Joe Biden won the state, fair and square.
This may turn out to be more important than it seems. Let me sketch this out.
Perdue is overtly grabbing the position that Trump is right, an election was stolen right from under the noses of the Republican officials in charge. This latter part impugns the reputation of Kemp and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R-GA), who, not so incidentally, is also a target of the former President, so they must eventually respond.
And they only have one reasonable response: There was no electoral fraud.
This is when Kemp can get into real trouble, and I’m sure he knows it. He’s faced with a fork in the road. On the left is playing to the preconceptions of a Georgia Republican Party convinced that it’s being separated from its rightful inheritance, resentful and even fearful of a future “full of socialists and communists”. As Perdue is trying to occupy that position already, and will have the assistance, incompetent as it may be, of the former President, it’s a tough row to hoe.
And that right fork? It may lead him to trying to talk some sense into the Republican Party. Here’s hypothetical Kemp:
- There was no electoral fraud;
- Biden won fair and square;
- If I had helped Raffensperger to “find” those 11,780 votes, that wouldn’t make me a hero, it would have made me a criminal.
- Does this party want to win by being criminals?
That’s really a key question. It brings up issues that lay at the heart of American politics and power: fairness, the limits of power, conceptions of what the other party is doing, even. The question of limits, debated by these two candidates, could lead to a lot of soul searching in the Georgia Republican Party.
Heck, it might upset a former President if the arguments go against him.
By no means count either candidate out in the primary – but if this is a particularly squalid and bitter primary, as the WaPo article suggests:
“This will be the ugliest, nastiest race this state has ever seen,” said one Georgia Republican who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the fraught nature of the race. “It is hyper-personal on both sides. Friendships, very long friendships, will be ruined and never recovered over this.”
Then some Georgia Republicans may choose to sit out the general election, out of resentfulness, and, as Erickson clearly fears, Abrams may win herself a governorship.
