ATLANTA — Georgia’s top Republicans have been all in on President Trump since day one.
They’ve backed his claims about a rigged voting system and followed his cues when he torched the reputation of high-ranking party members. But with Joe Biden’s win in the Peach State essentially a lock, barring a Hail Mary second recount overturning the result, some are wondering if now might be a good time to cut the cord with Trump and shift focus to winning two high-profile runoff races that will determine which party has power in the U.S. Senate.
“They are going to have to make a choice and make it very soon,” Gorgee Mukerjee, a West Coast political strategist, told the Washington Examiner. “They can stay with Trump and risk alienating voters or break with him and win back moderates.”
Mukerjee believes that backing Trump could hurt Senate candidates Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, who are locked in tight races against Democratic rivals Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.
Loeffler and Perdue have largely led the charge to appease Trump in Georgia.
The duo has enthusiastically gone along with his unsubstantiated claims of election rigging and followed his lead when he demanded Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger resign over refusing to say there had been widespread voter fraud in the state.
Raffensperger spent the better part of a week raising the ire of Trump supporters and fact-checking conspiracy theories spread by Trump’s campaign.
The lifelong Republican called Rep. Doug Collins, the man Trump tapped to head up his recount effort in Georgia, a “liar” and a “charlatan” and said Perdue and Loeffler “folded like a cheap suit” to Trump.
The back-and-forth isn’t helpful and could lead to deeper divisions in the party when it matters the most.
“We are getting a good look at who the grownups are in the party and who the charlatans are,” Karla Jacobs, a conservative activist, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Jacobs, like Mukerjee, believes the Georgia Republican Party is running on borrowed time.
“The GOP has got to decide who they want to be going forward,” Jacobs said. “Are they going to be the party of rude, loudmouth culture warriors, or are they going to be the party of sound government? They can’t be both, and they obviously can’t put together a lasting statewide coalition by trying to be both.”
Trump, though, may already be wearing out his welcome.
On Thursday, Georgia’s 159 counties finalized a costly and laborious election audit that required counting 5 million ballots by hand. The results reaffirmed Biden’s victory but shrank his lead by more than 1,200 votes.
Raffensperger ordered the audit as part of a new state law to ensure the accuracy of voting machines by comparing paper ballot counts with machine tallies. Despite errors in four counties, election officials said there were no signs of voter fraud and that the new $107 million voting system worked as it should. However, because the final tally was razor thin in Biden’s favor, Trump could ask for a recount.
If his campaign presses for one as expected, local counties would be forced to foot the bill.
That could be difficult in some areas where a combination of COVID-19 and other budgetary constraints have left them without much of a financial cushion.
There are other reasons why it might be wise to distance themselves from Trump.
Undermining a voting system that could hand Republicans crucial wins might not be in the best interest of the Republican Party, David McLaughlin, Democratic activist and host of the Kudzu Vine political podcast, told the Washington Examiner.
“You’re seeing the division between federal and local,” he said.
Georgia Republican Chairman David Shafer acknowledged the intraparty struggles but told the Washington Examiner he believes the GOP can turn it around.
“We are all under enormous pressure, and tensions are high,” he said this week.”But in the end, the consequences for America are too great for us not to come back together for the runoff elections.”
Allen Peake, a former GOP state legislator from Macon, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that he’s concerned the fear of retaliation from Trump is stifling Republicans from focusing on the Senate runoff races.
“If you are an elected official and want a future in politics, you have to fear the wrath of Trump,” Peake said, adding, “to me, that’s not a healthy scenario.”
