Georgia's Very Own Megathread!

[Buzz]

I’m so upset about this loser running. 

[OSR stands with Israel]

I think it's also worth noting that gubernatorial elections don't necessarily track the same as the national environment. Even in strong wave midterms, there's usually stuff for both parties. There is 2006, where Republicans didn't gain any governorships, but Democratic gains were somewhat underwhelming and reserved mostly to the low-hanging fruit. 1994 is probably the closest to a complete wipeout for Democrats. On the other hand, you have a strong Democratic year like 1986, but Democrats end up losing net 8 governorships (although Democrats had 34 governors at the time). Even more interesting is 2002, where 20 governorships changed parties.

Ultimately though, Georgia is a highly polarized state. I think what Stacey Abrams offers is enthusiasm for Democrats. I feel she's a genuinely exciting candidate for Democrats to get behind and the coalition to victory in the state is there now. The suburbs are hard to predict, but the key to victory in Georgia is to really juice minority turnout. It'll be especially interesting with her sharing the ballot with Senator Warnock. No one is going to run away with either race and that's something we all seem to recognize. I think it's far too soon to rate this race as anything other than a true toss-up.

Ehh I disagree as while Democrats picking up seats like NY/OH would be extremely predictable in early 2006 I dont think MD was. Elrich had pretty good approvals in Maryland and even right before election day O'Malley led by like 1 point:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/governor/md/maryland_governor_race-42.html

Id say if 2006 wasn't a Wave Elrich would have been reelected.

[politicallefty]

Ehh I disagree as while Democrats picking up seats like NY/OH would be extremely predictable in early 2006 I dont think MD was. Elrich had pretty good approvals in Maryland and even right before election day O'Malley led by like 1 point:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/governor/md/maryland_governor_race-42.html

Id say if 2006 wasn't a Wave Elrich would have been reelected.

I wasn't saying that waves can't move things. They most certainly do. I agree that states like NY, OH, and MA were the low-hanging fruit. For MD, I think a neutral environment would've made the race a pure toss-up. However, you also have to factor in the natural environment of certain states. That said, Charlie Cook still had MD rated a toss-up at the end. My point with 2006 is that Democrats didn't do nearly as well as expected in terms of governorships. They came up short in Alaska, Minnesota, and Nevada, not to mention the Lean R seats.

[Sir Mohamed]

Ehh I disagree as while Democrats picking up seats like NY/OH would be extremely predictable in early 2006 I dont think MD was. Elrich had pretty good approvals in Maryland and even right before election day O'Malley led by like 1 point:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/governor/md/maryland_governor_race-42.html

Id say if 2006 wasn't a Wave Elrich would have been reelected.

I wasn't saying that waves can't move things. They most certainly do. I agree that states like NY, OH, and MA were the low-hanging fruit. For MD, I think a neutral environment would've made the race a pure toss-up. However, you also have to factor in the natural environment of certain states. That said, Charlie Cook still had MD rated a toss-up at the end. My point with 2006 is that Democrats didn't do nearly as well as expected in terms of governorships. They came up short in Alaska, Minnesota, and Nevada, not to mention the Lean R seats.

True for sure, though statewide races were far less nationalized than they are today. Blue states like CT, CA and HI also reelected GOP govs in landslides that year. At the same time, Phil Bredesen and Dave Freudenthal won landslides in deep red states. Even 2010 was less polarizing; Mike Beebe won AR in a landslide with all counties.

[wbrocks67]

People are really overestimating Abrams here.

The GOP is having a hot ass mess primary right now and Abrams is the one being overestimated? Now sis.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Election Guy thinks it's an R wave don't mind him because what of D's win, the GOP party has lost the PVI at the Prez level and won it only once since 1988, the D's won 80M votes

[Хahar 🤔]

Hopefully Perdue running will make people shut up about Vernon Jones. Kemp has a lot of allies in the Republican Party (it's worth considering how many county Republican organizations didn't censure him because of the work of those allies), but the Kemp/Cagle primary in 2018 was resolved in Kemp's favor thanks to an intervention from the big man upstairs, and Kemp will never get that this time. It's hard to see his path to winning.

As for the general election, it's possible that Kemp would do poorly in a general election just because Republican voters would stay home, but generally speaking I don't expect candidate quality to matter much. Georgia elections are generic R against generic D. People kept talking about how awful a candidate Kelly Loeffler was and how poorly her campaign went, and she did exactly the same as great candidate David Perdue.

[Del Tachi]

Trump endorsing early means its effect is going to be somewhat "baked in" for a May primary.  I.e., don't expect a late surge toward Perdue (like Kemp had in 2018), it's going to be a slog to the finish.

The cleavage here is going to be the state/county GOP organization (Kemp) vs Trump surrogates and aligned national media (Perdue.)  I'll rate the primary as toss-up/Tilt Kemp to start. 

[Nutmeg]

People are really overestimating Abrams here.

Agreed. Anecdotes don't decide elections, but a decent share of people I know in Georgia who voted for Biden, Warnock, and Ossoff don't care for Abrams after she refused to concede the 2018 election. Granted, these people largely are country club Republican types who live in Buckhead and Sandy Springs who retain some Republican affinity, but most of them did vote for Abrams 3 years ago.

[Хahar 🤔]

The cleavage here is going to be the state/county GOP organization (Kemp) vs Trump surrogates and aligned national media (Perdue.)  I'll rate the primary as toss-up/Tilt Kemp to start. 

The issue that I see with this assessment is that Kemp doesn't have enough of the Republican organization behind him. He has a lot of allies, which is why he's not going to go quietly, but the Georgia Republican Party is not a united organization. The people who stood behind Cagle (and there are an awful lot of those) are organization men too, and they're not going to help Kemp. The Perdue-aligned group here isn't just a band of outsiders parachuting in.

[Del Tachi]

The cleavage here is going to be the state/county GOP organization (Kemp) vs Trump surrogates and aligned national media (Perdue.)  I'll rate the primary as toss-up/Tilt Kemp to start. 

The issue that I see with this assessment is that Kemp doesn't have enough of the Republican organization behind him. He has a lot of allies, which is why he's not going to go quietly, but the Georgia Republican Party is not a united organization. The people who stood behind Cagle (and there are an awful lot of those) are organization men too, and they're not going to help Kemp. The Perdue-aligned group here isn't just a band of outsiders parachuting in.

I think Kemp is broadly popular enough among the business community and GOP county/committee chairs to not have these people (or Republicans in the GA legislature) abandon him for what is, at the end of the day, a grievence campaign from David Perdue (who himself was not the first pick of the GOP establishment in his own contested primary for U.S. Senate in 2014.) 

Perdue has cast his lot as Trump's candidate, which is still a very unproven strategy for winning a GOP contest (i.e., we've seen plenty of conservatives best Trump-supported candidates before.)  Kemp's incumbency makes the lift only that much harder.

In contrast, I do think we'll see Perdue relying on national organization and surrogates throughout the primary.  That's the only way to stir-up turnout among Trump acolytes in a primary for state row office.  Perdue's not as established or popular among the GA-GOP as many seem to think, and certainly not now.     

[GALeftist]

People are really overestimating Abrams here.

Agreed. Anecdotes don't decide elections, but a decent share of people I know in Georgia who voted for Biden, Warnock, and Ossoff don't care for Abrams after she refused to concede the 2018 election. Granted, these people largely are country club Republican types who live in Buckhead and Sandy Springs who retain some Republican affinity, but most of them did vote for Abrams 3 years ago.

Not saying you're wrong, but I know quite a few of these types of people personally and very few of them even know that she didn't concede, and a lot of the ones that do think (as do I) that it was a frivolous but ultimately mostly harmless statement about draconian election laws whose absence might have forced Kemp into a runoff rather than a statement that the votes as tabulated were incorrect. I can't really think of any Abrams 2018 voters who have soured on her since then off the top of my head, although I'm sure some do exist out there.

Does anyone have favorability numbers for Abrams in 2018? Might settle this debate if those took a hit (or didn't) after the election.

[President Johnson]

Trump endorsing early means its effect is going to be somewhat "baked in" for a May primary.  I.e., don't expect a late surge toward Perdue (like Kemp had in 2018), it's going to be a slog to the finish.

The cleavage here is going to be the state/county GOP organization (Kemp) vs Trump surrogates and aligned national media (Perdue.)  I'll rate the primary as toss-up/Tilt Kemp to start. 

What do you think Trump is going to do if Kemp indeed wins the nomination? Just sit it out, endorse him reluctantly or will he at least somehow call upon his supporters to vote for Abrams? Latter would be extremely hilarious and instantly move it to Lean Democratic.

I still believe Kemp will go down and the general election is at least Tilt Republican.

[Del Tachi]

Trump endorsing early means its effect is going to be somewhat "baked in" for a May primary.  I.e., don't expect a late surge toward Perdue (like Kemp had in 2018), it's going to be a slog to the finish.

The cleavage here is going to be the state/county GOP organization (Kemp) vs Trump surrogates and aligned national media (Perdue.)  I'll rate the primary as toss-up/Tilt Kemp to start. 

What do you think Trump is going to do if Kemp indeed wins the nomination? Just sit it out, endorse him reluctantly or will he at least somehow call upon his supporters to vote for Abrams? Latter would be extremely hilarious and instantly move it to Lean Democratic.

I still believe Kemp will go down and the general election is at least Tilt Republican.

Trump probably tucks his tail and goes home to lick his wounds, and there's enough of an anti-Biden vote in November for either Perdue or Kemp to win. 

[wbrocks67]

People are really overestimating Abrams here.

Agreed. Anecdotes don't decide elections, but a decent share of people I know in Georgia who voted for Biden, Warnock, and Ossoff don't care for Abrams after she refused to concede the 2018 election. Granted, these people largely are country club Republican types who live in Buckhead and Sandy Springs who retain some Republican affinity, but most of them did vote for Abrams 3 years ago.

So they voted for Biden, Warnock, and Ossoff ... and Abrams in 2018, but they don't know about the specific circumstances in 2018 that happened to Abrams that caused the issue that she raised? That sounds... very suspect

[Shaula🏳️‍⚧️]

Trump endorsing early means its effect is going to be somewhat "baked in" for a May primary.  I.e., don't expect a late surge toward Perdue (like Kemp had in 2018), it's going to be a slog to the finish.

The cleavage here is going to be the state/county GOP organization (Kemp) vs Trump surrogates and aligned national media (Perdue.)  I'll rate the primary as toss-up/Tilt Kemp to start. 

What do you think Trump is going to do if Kemp indeed wins the nomination? Just sit it out, endorse him reluctantly or will he at least somehow call upon his supporters to vote for Abrams? Latter would be extremely hilarious and instantly move it to Lean Democratic.

I still believe Kemp will go down and the general election is at least Tilt Republican.

I think he'll tell his supporters to not vote and jokingly a couple times say to vote for Abrams, to the annoyance of Kemp and the GOP.

[MargieCat]

Imagine if Perdue and Hice win the primary, only to lose to Abrams and Bee Nguyen.

They will blame Kemp and Raffensberger for not handing them the election, and say that it was retaliation for their primaries.

[Suburbia]

Tossup until the end.

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Tossup until the end.

There is always Split voting

[LostFellow]

Still going with my opinion from 7 months ago:

Honestly this race seems safe Kemp to me.

Not really safe anymore, but still think the deep south is uniquely an area where enacting staunchly conservative policies beats the Trump endorsement. I also think Perdue being a loser while Kemp a winner gives an obvious contrast in favor with Kemp.

[lfromnj]

Still going with my opinion from 7 months ago:

Honestly this race seems safe Kemp to me.

Not really safe anymore, but still think the deep south is uniquely an area where enacting staunchly conservative policies beats the Trump endorsement. I also think Perdue being a loser while Kemp a winner gives an obvious contrast in favor with Kemp.

AVR is a Staunchly conservative policy?

[LostFellow]

Still going with my opinion from 7 months ago:

Honestly this race seems safe Kemp to me.

Not really safe anymore, but still think the deep south is uniquely an area where enacting staunchly conservative policies beats the Trump endorsement. I also think Perdue being a loser while Kemp a winner gives an obvious contrast in favor with Kemp.

AVR is a Staunchly conservative policy?

I can't believe I'm defending Kemp, ugh.

Purdue isn't going to be attacking Kemp on AVR lol. AVR is certainly not favored by conservatives, but few voters would consider the issue a top priority. Kemp has signaled enough red meat to the base to check off the boxes of social and cultural conservatism and perfectly matches the image of exurban Canton, GA. The big question of the 2022 GOP primary will be "who can best stop the radical Abrams/Biden agenda?" Trump will become increasingly irrelevant, so I can't imagine "the big lie" mattering much at all in favor of Purdue.

[wbrocks67]

Yeah the thing for Perdue is that he just isn't credible - he's got Trumps endorsement but he's also literally 1/2 of the reason that GOP lost the senate in January, so.

[CookieDamage]

Yeah the thing for Perdue is that he just isn't credible - he's got Trumps endorsement but he's also literally 1/2 of the reason that GOP lost the senate in January, so.

Agreed. I keep seeing takes that he would make the race tilt or lean R because he is the Trump candidate... but he's still a loser. That matters. Of course Abrams lost too but her loss didn't flip the Senate.

[GeorgiaModerate]

https://twitter.com/Emma_Hurt/status/1468598369291546634