Georgia's Very Own Megathread! (v2)

[Del Tachi]

Brian Kemp was at UGA last saturday.

Where's Stacey at?

Probably calling her donors from New York and California

[Del Tachi]

Brian Kemp was at UGA last saturday.

Where's Stacey at?

Probably calling her donors from New York and California

She has way more in-state small dollar donations than Brian Kemp. Just because Brian Kemp has more wealthy donors to choose from inside the state doesn't make him a better candidate. 

Small donors are still a fractional source of funding for Abrams' campaign.  She's raised more money from big-time out-of-state donors like George Soros (who gave $1.5 million) that small donors, and many of her small donors are probably from out-of-state as well.

Like it or not, Abrams' fundraising is a weakness that Kemp will be able to capitalize upon.

[Del Tachi]

A fellow Georgian and I were discussing what this election might have looked like if we could have had the best of both worlds: Carter's better numbers and/or Abrams' better numbers for each county. Well, I've went ahead and calculated it.

For the counties where Abrams' margin was better, I used 2018 percentages (below; yellow). Where they were better for Carter, I used the 2014 percentages (green). Because of the vastly different turnout levels for the 2 elections, I took each county's share of the electorate for both 2014 and 2018 and averaged it, and used that to calculate the raw votes each candidate received in an election with 3.9 million voters.



I also had to reconcile the Libertarian vote share differences: in short, I gave 10% of the excess Libertarian vote share to Abrams and 90% to Kemp (realistic - maybe even overly generous to Kemp).

Not only would she be in the lead, she would have won outright:

Hybrid Carter-Abrams Majority Win

50.15% - 1962929 - Abrams
48.90% - 1913946 - Kemp
0.95% - 37088 - Metz

(Colors are exact Atlas colors but some counties show up a shade darker/lighter due to the way I have to tell Google Fusion Tables to color the map; Douglas is a good example, as it's below 40% GOP, it colors it with >60% Dem)

The tightrope Dems have to walk in Georgia is intimidating.

Metro Atlanta will continue to grow and trend D, however.

[Del Tachi]

If I were Abrams I'd hold out and wait for a John Lewis retirement in 2020 or 2022.

[Del Tachi]

Agree with Adam.  Abrams should definitely sit GA-SEN out, she'd do worse than in 2018.

[Del Tachi]

Adam, looking at your 2018 precinct map, how many DeKalb precincts did Kemp win?  Only 5?   What was the number in 2010?  2002?

[Del Tachi]

Who will be the Republican front runner for Senate if Isakson retires in 2022? If Handel had won last year (and 2020) I would say her to combat the gender gap and hemorrhaging of Republican support in the Suburbs.... but she didn't.

Ideally Beth Beskin, but I'm pipe-dreaming

[Del Tachi]

Apparently Kemp is trying to expand Medicaid? That’d actually be smart of him. He’s walking on thin ice as is and that’d be a noose hanging around his neck in ‘22. He pretty much needs to do it to have any hope of winning again.

Not quite.  He's interested in seeking a "waiver" from HHS which would give Georgia more leeway in how it develops and implements its Medicaid program.  Kemp has stated that this would be done with the goal of increased eligibility, but it's still a big question how it would affect existing benefit standards and how rural hospitals would fare.  I have faith that Kemp and Republicans in the state legislature can come up with a quality plan, but it won't be the full-scale expansions we've seen in states like Louisiana and Virginia. 

AJC had a good write-up on the discussion yesterday.

[Del Tachi]

So going back a few pages, what is going on with Southwest Georgia? A large African American population, relative big speaking outside Savannah in Georgia, but it's been shifting Republican to the point that even Bishop has been somewhat threatened in bad years. What gives , Adam?

Black depopulation, combined with continued GOP trends among White voters.

[Del Tachi]

Glad to see the folks in Gwinnett vote this down.  It was a multi-billion dollar tax hike and, for what? a single heavy-rail line station 4 miles from the DeKalb County line