Former President Donald Trump has been batting around .500 when endorsing Republicans in this year's GOP Congressional and gubernatorial primaries. But if there was one race which Trump would consider the crown jewel, it would be the Georgia gubernatorial primary where he desires to upend incumbent Brian Kemp in favor of David Perdue. It's not so much that Perdue is a solid MAGA candidate as much as it is Trump having personal animosity towards Kemp.
It all started at the end of 2019 when Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson retired from the U.S. Senate due to poor health. With Kemp having the purview to appoint a successor, then President Trump lobbied the Governor to appoint Congressman Doug Collins, who just happened to be an ardent supporter of Trump's. However, Kemp opted to name Kelly Loeffler as Isakson's successor, thus infuriating Trump.
A few months after Loeffler assumed office, the U.S. was about six weeks into the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite most of the country sheltering in place, Kemp was one of the first Governors to start relaxing restrictions by allowing some businesses to reopen. Naturally there were many detractors (including a maniacal, hyperbolic piece in The Atlantic saying Georgia was experimenting in "human sacrifice"). But you would think that if anyone would laud Kemp it would've been Trump given how alarmed he became over America's suddenly cratering economy. But Trump indicated he disagreed with Kemp's decision, not so much because he feared it wouldn't validate his desire to cautiously reopen things but more because Trump's pettiness knows no bounds. And the fact that Kemp ended up being vindicated on his decision really had to irritate Trump.
But Trump's disdain for Kemp likely grew into a full blown hatred when the Governor would not acquiesce to his demands to call a special session of the Legislature in order to overturn Joe Biden's victory in Georgia in the 2020 presidential election. It was about at that point where Trump started accusing Kemp of being in cahoots with Stacey Abrams (the Democrat whom Kemp defeated in the 2018 GA gubernatorial race) to rig the election against him.
So when the opportunity came along to further undermine Kemp, you knew Trump would seize. Enter Perdue, the former U.S. Senator out of Georgia who lost to empty suit Jon Ossoff in the January 2021 runoff elections (ironically, Perdue's defeat was in no small part due to Trump sowing doubt in the electoral process). Perdue then ran with the Trump rhetoric of the 2020 election in Georgia being stolen, including his own race 16+ months ago.
After all this, I'm beginning to suspect Trump just isn't that well liked among Georgia Republicans. Despite being within single digits of Kemp early in the primary campaign, Perdue's efforts now look to be in vain ahead of Tuesday's primary -- even Trump concedes that.
Trump isn’t planning to make any more personal appearances in Georgia in Perdue’s behalf, having sunk enough of his own political capital in a race that looks like a lost cause, said a fourth source, a person close to the former president, speaking on condition of anonymity to talk more freely about Perdue’s prospects.
“David either has a bunch of geniuses working for him — because he’s basically spent no money — or he’s run the most flawed campaign in America,” this person said while noting that Perdue still has an outside shot at forcing a runoff.
“At the end of the day, Donald Trump doesn’t care about David Perdue winning. He just cared about Brian Kemp losing,” said Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, a Republican who chose not to run for re-election and incurred Trump’s wrath for defending the state’s 2020 election. “And that was a very shallow attempt at trying to unseat a perfectly fit conservative governor.”
The fact of the matter is there is no reason to kick out Gov. Kemp. Georgia has one of the more thriving state economies in the nation due to Kemp's prudence in dealing with COVID. In addition to that, the peach state became the 25th in the nation to pass Constitutional Carry and it was just announced that Hyundai will be building a $5.5 billion electric vehicle plant in the southeast part of the state. No amount of Trump's bluster can counter Kemp's phenomenal conservative record.
In the end, I kinda feel bad for Perdue. Trump played a factor in him losing his old job and then threw Perdue under the bus when he couldn't compete with a popular incumbent governor. You gotta wonder if Trump's rage toward Kemp is so deep that he would throw his support behind the Democrat candidate Abrams. Unlikely, but the chances are nonzero.
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