Byron York’s Daily Memo: GOP disaster in Georgia

GOP DISASTER IN GEORGIA. The Republican Party had a distinct advantage going into the twin Senate runoffs in Georgia. All it had to do was win one of the races — GOP Senator Kelly Loeffler vs. Democratic challenger Raphael Warnock or GOP Senator David Perdue vs. Jon Ossoff — to retain control of the Senate. Now, it appears Republicans have lost them both. If that turns out to be the case, Democrats will have shaky but critical control of the Senate. That, along with a Democratic House and a Democratic president, gives the party total control of Washington. And it leaves Republicans totally out in the cold.

Warnock has defeated Loeffler by about 53,000 votes, or 50.6 percent to 49.4 percent. That race has been called by all the media and is over. The Perdue-Ossoff race is still too close to call, with Ossoff holding a 16,370-vote lead, or 50.2 percent to 49.8 percent. There are still ballots that haven’t been counted, including military and overseas ballots, but according to FiveThirtyEight, “The vote that still needs to be counted is thought to be in mostly Democratic-leaning counties…so at this point, it seems as if Ossoff stands a good chance of continuing to build his lead over Perdue.” Even now, Ossoff’s advantage over Perdue is larger than Joe Biden’s 11,779-vote winning margin in Georgia last November.

So it appears that Donald Trump will leave office with the opposition party in control of the White House, the House, and the Senate. How did that happen? You’ll hear many commentators attributing the losses to what they will say is Trump’s unique awfulness. You’ve heard the argument a million times in the last four years. But remember that Barack Obama, after two terms, left the White House, House, and Senate in the hands of the opposition party. So did George W. Bush. Voters get tired of presidents and seek change. Yes, they got tired of Trump in one term rather than two. But voters seek change.

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Non-Trump factors were at work, too. One of them was the fact that Loeffler was a poor candidate. Remember, she was appointed by Georgia Governor Brian Kemp in December 2019 to fill the term of Republican Senator Johnny Isaakson, who resigned for health reasons. Kemp had better choices — Republican Representative Doug Collins badly wanted the job and would have undoubtedly been a better senator and a better candidate in 2020. He had President Trump’s support. But Kemp chose Loeffler. When it came time for the campaign, Collins challenged Loeffler for the GOP nomination, leading to a tough primary fight. That was certainly part of the story of Loeffler’s defeat. “As damaging as Trump’s behavior has been to Republicans, they probably would have avoided much of the pain if Kemp had picked Doug Collins to the vacant Senate seat,” tweeted National Journal columnist Josh Kraushaar. “Would have avoided damaging fight to the right before November.”

But it’s also true that Trump played an outsized role in this campaign. Of course he was at center stage last November, when he was on the ballot for re-election. Presidents are always at center stage when they’re on the ballot. But Trump made the conscious choice to remain at center stage during the Georgia runoff campaign, after his own re-election campaign was over. The president chose to challenge the election results in Georgia, to allege massive fraud, and to attack Kemp and the entire Republican establishment in the state. He said the November 3 election was totally corrupt, even as recounts confirmed Biden’s narrow victory.

Which led to a mixed message. Trump traveled to Georgia twice during the runoff campaign. Both times his message was: The last vote was totally corrupt. So now, go vote again. He stoked Georgia Republicans’ suspicions about the election results even as he urged them to return to the polls for a second round.

Trump’s refusal to accept the election result kept his conflict, and not the candidacies of Loeffler and Perdue, in the spotlight. And it kept many Democrats’ anti-Trump passions, which were on full display in the November 3 vote, alive and hot through the January 5 runoffs. Yes, when Trump visited Georgia for a campaign rally, as he did in Dalton on election eve, he drew a large, enthusiastic crowd. But Trump’s outsized role in the runoff campaign also motivated those much-discussed suburban voters who had soured on the president over the last four years to vote against him again, by voting against Perdue and Loeffler. The runoffs became contests about Trump, rather than referenda on the two Republican candidates.

So now, it appears Republicans have lost everything. The important thing to remember is that it has happened before, in recent years, when Democrats lost everything after Obama and Republicans lost everything after George W. Bush. Now, in opposition, the GOP’s next chapter begins. And remember this, too: For all the talk about Donald Trump remaining the defining voice of the Republican Party, his power is declining by the minute. At this point, he is the lamest of lame ducks, and after January 20 he will be a former president. He will undoubtedly be the most flamboyant and interesting former president in history, but he will still be a former president. The party will move ahead. New leaders will emerge. That’s the way it works.