On Tuesday, Georgia’s Republicans delivered a beat-down to Donald Trump. Across the board, they rejected his picks for state office. Governor Brian Kemp and attorney general Chris Carr, both incumbents, each grabbed more than 73% of the primary vote. Meanwhile, Brad Raffensperger, Trump’s bete noire and Georgia’s secretary of state, escaped a runoff as he cleared the crucial 50% mark.
In the aftermath of the 2020 election, the trio collectively refused to “find” 11,780 votes for Trump. Instead, they defended the verdict of Georgia’s voters, accepted Joe Biden’s win and earned Trump’s wrath. Now, less than two years later, they reminded Trump that he was merely an influential bystander to comings and goings in the Peach state.
Their collective humiliation of the 45th president was now complete. Adding insult to injury, a Georgia grand jury continues to weigh whether to indict Trump for his ham-handed alleged effort to influence the election. Meanwhile, betting pools place the chances of Florida’s Ron DeSantis winning the 2024 Republican presidential nominee on par with the former guy.
For the record, Tuesday was not a total wipeout for Trump. He could point to wins among a motley crew he could call his very own.
Herschel Walker captured the Republican nod for Georgia’s senator. A legendary University of Georgia football star, Walker also possesses a record of alleged domestic violence and abuse.
His friendship with Trump spans decades. Walker played football for the New Jersey Generals, Trump’s team in the short-lived USFL. On the campaign trail, Walker claimed he had never heard Trump denounce the 2020 election as stolen.
Likewise, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the hyper-performative high-priestess of Maga-hood, sailed to renomination in north-west Georgia. Whatever consternation she may cause nationally, it was not discernible in her home district. She notched nearly 70% of the vote.
Over in Texas, Ken Paxton defeated George P Bush in a runoff for attorney general. Paxton, the incumbent attorney general, cruised to a runoff victory over the grandson of one president and the nephew of a second.
Of all Republican state attorney generals, Paxton was the most slavishly loyal to Trump. In December 2020, Paxton filed a lawsuit in the US supreme court against Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. He accused the four electoral battlegrounds of having “destroyed” the public’s trust and “compromised the security and integrity of the 2020 election”.
Some things never change. After Tuesday’s Texas school massacre, Paxton suggested arming teachers as a solution. Gun control was not an option. Trump, Texas governor Greg Abbott, and Senator Ted Cruz are set to speak at a National Rifle Association meeting scheduled for later this week in Houston.
But the evening’s dominant messages to Trump in contests for state office were clear. Competence and performance still counted, and incumbent officeholders possess a political arsenal of their very own.
Earlier this year, Jay Walker, a Kemp adviser, repeatedly told deep-pocketed donors that the governor stood ready to gut his challenger, David Perdue, Trump’s pick and a defeated former US senator.
“We’re going to go fucking scorched-earth,” Walker supposedly said. “When you got your foot on someone’s neck, you don’t take it off until the race is over, or they’ve run out of oxygen.”
Unlike congressmen and senators, voters expect governors to get things done; Kemp did just that. The Associated Press called his race just 90 minutes after the polls closed.
Then again, Perdue offered Republicans little reason to vote for him. He had lost his 2021 insurrection eve runoff to Jon Ossoff, a candidate once graphically derided by the late and toxic Rush Limbaugh.
Practically speaking, Perdue should have just stamped a giant “L” on his own forehead. He was damaged goods from the start.
On the campaign trail, Perdue repeated the big lie that the 2020 elections were stolen. But as a member of one of Georgia’s pre-eminent political families, his shtick reeked of pandering.
His heart wasn’t in it. Beyond that, he had marinated his closing message in unalloyed racial resentment, with remarks widely interpreted as lashing out at Stacey Abrams, the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, for simply being Black.
Significantly, Trump’s defeats in Georgia follow his recent losses in the Idaho and Nebraska gubernatorial Republican primaries. In other words, Kemp’s win fits an emerging pattern.
In Idaho, Janice McGeachin, the state’s Trump-endorsed lieutenant governor and a favorite of the far right, failed to dislodge the already very conservative governor, Brad Little. Unlike Little, McGeachin delivered a video address to the America First Political Action Conference, an event organized by Nick Fuentes, a prominent white nationalist.
Over in Nebraska, Charles Herbster, the Trump-endorsed candidate, went down in defeat after several women accused him of sexual misconduct. Apparently, Trump’s own “luck” on that score was personal, and not readily transferable to Herbster. Instead, Nebraska Republicans went with Jim Pillen, a University of Nebraska regent, who was endorsed by the state’s Republican establishment.
To be sure, the spirit of Maga remains very much alive. Marjorie Taylor Greene will return to Congress. Herschel Walker is holding his own in hypothetical match-ups against Senator Raphael Warnock. Even Kemp is no never-Trump. Yet Trump’s endorsement can no longer be reflexively equated with a primary victory.
Ask Mehmet Oz; he can tell you. Right now, Pennsylvania continues its count of primary ballots. A recount looms. Whether Dr Oz, a Trump endorsee, holds on remains to be seen. Regardless, Trump’s sway in 2022 may have peaked.
Lloyd Green is an attorney in New York. He was opposition research counsel to George HW Bush’s 1988 campaign and served in the Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992
