Donald Trump Heading To Georgia To Save, Sabotage Senate Runoffs

Georgia GOP hopes cooler heads prevail, should any be found.

With Georgia wingnuts all ready to throw rotten peaches at state leaders for betraying Donald Trump and letting Joe Biden win, the Great Man himself is flying to the state Saturday for a great big superspreader slob picnic. Ostensibly, he's going there to urge people to get out and vote for Republican Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, but plenty of state GOP leaders are worried he's just as likely to spend the rally griping about the election outcome and insisting the vote was rigged. Gee, ya think?

Allen Peake, a former state legislator, told Politico he hopes Trump will make the case for Republicans to turn out to vote for Loeffler and Perdue in the Jan. 5 runoffs, and that he won't put on a "peripheral sideshow of whining and complaining and making baseless accusations." Haha, you are a real dreamer, Mr. Peake! He went on to acknowledge, "But that's kind of been his mode for the past four years. I don't think he will change. So I'm very concerned about this on Saturday."

Let me tell you, we are all very very concerned that the paranoia and disinformation might lead many Georgia Trump supporters to stay home. What a great shame it would be if the GOP's non-monogamous relationship with reality came back to bite it on the ass, leading to wins for Democratic challengers Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff. We would probably be sad to see the party get its comeuppance, you bet.

If you need a nice dose of schadenfreude, go read Politico's piece on just how nervous Georgia Republicans are about Trump's rally. Will he focus on helping Loeffler and Perdue? Will he just spend two hours insisting the vote in Georgia is rigged? We're happy to predict both: He'll mention the candidates and the runoff because it's on the teleprompter, but Trump will probably go right back to whining about how unfairly Gov. Brian Kemp and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger treated him, because hey, they knew he was a snake when they took him in. He might even hit both notes at the same time: "The election's totally rigged and dishonest, but what the hell, go vote if you think it'll help. You know I won, but maybe the machines will record your votes right, who knows?"

Also very very sad: Politico notes that most of the Georgia GOP insiders

who confessed to significant concerns about the upcoming election did not want to speak on the record for fear of incurring the wrath of the president or getting in the middle of what feels like a circular firing squad.

One GOP consultant — the poor dear! — fretted that Trump has "people all stirred up over this voter fraud stuff and now we're worried they might not vote, so we need him to come back to make sure people do, but we're worried that might backfire."

Golly, what a surprise things have come to such a pass. The consultant comforted himself by saying. "The good news is that fear and anger drive voters, and we've got those in spades."

It also doesn't help Loeffler a hell of a lot that Trump is still mad at Kemp for appointing her to her Senate seat instead of Trump's preferred candidate, Rep. Doug Collins, who's likely to run against Kemp in the 2022 primary for governor, almost certainly with Trump's backing. And given all the wingnut anger over the election, Kemp's likely to be kicked to the curb, as is Raffensperger, who didn't do enough to twist democracy in the GOP's favor.

The complete stupidity of Georgia wingnuts' mood is perfectly illustrated in today's  Washington Post story revealing that, horror or horrors, Perdue seemed to "tacitly acknowledge" that Joe Biden will be president when he spoke online with members of the Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) Wednesday. In a video of the Zoom chat the Post "obtained" (yay, leakers!), Perdue said a whole bunch of things about how keeping the Senate was important to stop Joe Biden from doing socialism, as if Perdue really believes the heresy that Trump won't have a second term.

"We know what this change of command at the top will mean with our foreign relations," Perdue said in the video, adding: "If we can keep the majority in the Senate, we can at least be a buffer on some of the things that the Biden camp has been talking about in terms of their foreign policy."

But, but, but it hasn't been decided, and everyone knows Trump really won by a landslide! Even if Perdue referred to Trump as "the last administration" when he said it might be possible for Biden and Mitch McConnell to do some deals for good things. Golly, Perdue didn't even talk about how he would help Trump succeed in a second term.

And wow, look at the backpedaling!

Perdue spokesman John Burke called the video a "non-story," adding: "Senator Perdue totally supports President Trump and his fight for transparency and accuracy in this election. Perdue for weeks has been repeatedly sounding the alarm about what the consequences of total Democratic control of Congress would be if [Senate Majority Leader Charles E.] Schumer wins these two seats in Georgia."

Leaders of the RJC similarly said it was "grasping at straws" to suggest that Perdue had accepted reality, because you bet, the fraud was rampant and Trump will have a second term. It's 2020 denial syndrome.

Loeffler had her own little slip during the call, too, though not as bad. She didn't mention Biden by name, but she did refer to the need for Republicans to keep the Senate majority to keep "them" accountable:

"We are going to hold them accountable in that advise-and-consent process," Loeffler said in the video. "So, you know, I think we're going to see a lot of folks from the Obama administration come back, which is, you know, a great chance for us to review their records and hold them accountable for their track records."

And once again, a Loeffler flack, Stephen Lawson, said heavens no, that didn't mean she'd be opposing a President Biden, far from it, because she supports Donald Trump's efforts to "ensure the results of the election are accurate while she also works to hold the Senate majority on January 5th," don't you see? Lawson proclaimed the video "a total non-story."

One that will no doubt leave Donald Trump getting angrier and angrier as he travels to Georgia to call for people to vote for the two senators who very clearly betrayed him. That rally should be really interesting. Not that we'll be watching, that guy no longer matters.

[ Politico / CNN / WaPo ]

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