GA SEN: Perdue plans hug Trump and appeal to suburban moderates

[Adam Griffin]

Hugging Trump and appealing to suburban moderates? I don’t see how you can do both. That said, this is Safe R due to Georgia’s elections chief being extremely corrupt. Raffensperger is just as willing to purge the rolls as Kemp, and that will make the race unwinnable for Democrats.

It's pretty simple, really.

1) His "hugging Trump" will consist of not ever publicly attacking or criticizing him, which will keep him in good graces and a) hopefully prevent any wasteful primary challenge and b) keep rural turnout and support at levels organically high enough to not warrant much attention campaign-wise.

2) His appealing to suburbrons will be the primary focus of his campaign, and likely where almost all of his energy is directed.

You can more or less read between the lines in that article that Perdue had disdain for Kemp's "Rural Strategy" - because while it did work, he probably genuinely believes it was the best of the worst/only option (i.e. Kemp was a bad fit for GA, and a combination of his positions and approvals made it mandatory to pretty much cede suburban GA and look for votes elsewhere), and that a better GOP candidate wouldn't have been forced to approach it from that angle. I'm sure Perdue also feels like Kemp getting the nomination screwed his re-election chances a bit because of the required suburban neglect for winning that one election.

[Adam Griffin]

Just to provide some historical/regional perspective: Perdue and Deal's combined campaign efforts in 2014 were arguably the only example in modern times of the GOP ignoring the entirety of North Georgia to focus on suburban ATL areas. The local GOP committees here couldn't even get campaign material or yard signs - in the heart of GOP territory! If you were an organizer in the area at the time, you could feel it and see it everywhere you looked.

It was the only modern cycle before or since where Democrats absolutely dominated 2-3:1 in the (usually and admittedly useless) sign game all across North Georgia and where the local, tangible Democratic efforts were more or less conducted in a vacuum without opposition; this is a huge reason why the 2010-2014 Gubernatorial and Senatorial swings were so favorable to Democrats in the non-metro north.

At any rate, I don't expect Perdue's campaign to deviate much from that, until or unless they believe that there are no gains to be made in the suburbs. They more or less ran a persuasion-based campaign in 2014 and I expect that is what will be done in 2020 as well (increasingly - though maybe not by 2020 - they won't have any other choice).

[Adam Griffin]

At any rate, I don't expect Perdue's campaign to deviate much from that, until or unless they believe that there are no gains to be made in the suburbs. They more or less ran a persuasion-based campaign in 2014 and I expect that is what will be done in 2020 as well (increasingly - though maybe not by 2020 - they won't have any other choice).

What do you think the playbook will be for the GOP come 22 when Isakson retire and Kemp has to run again?

I suppose it depends on how well/poorly Perdue does in the suburbs, whether or not he wins re-election, and who's in the White House. It's a simple mathematical reality at this point that there isn't much more that can be squeezed out of most of rural GA (and my belief is that most of what they can squeeze out of there will come organically, with or without GOP campaign efforts there, and depends just as much on who the Democrats run). If/once you're maxed there, you have to turn to the suburbs if you want any chance of staying in the game. Kemp basically milked every drop of vote out of the southern half of the state and still only managed to avoid a humiliating runoff by 0.2 points (the fact that his opponent was a polarizing black female basically offset the lower turnout dynamic the GOP would have otherwise faced during the Trump era).

2014 really stuck out in terms of how they treated rural and suburban areas, and was arguably the first preview of a swing state future. Both Carter and Nunn were considered the first viable Democratic candidates in a long time: both the Dems and the GOP believed this, whether it ended up being true or not. As such and due to a Dem being in the WH (likely believing GOP turnout would be high regardless), the GOP really focused on persuasion to mitigate any potential worst-case scenario and cut Dems off at the pass. The difference in 2020 is that persuasion will become an absolute necessity given higher Democratic turnout and six years' worth of demographic shift.

I expect Kemp to adopt a completely different persona for re-election; he was never actually an extremist at heart (though he played one on TV) and since winning has seemingly tried to keep out of controversy. Deal wasn't exactly popular in the run-up to his re-election but managed to win given the lean of the state and the partisan climate + finished his second term out with 2:1 favorables. That's probably his '22 playbook (which will be similar to Perdue's in '20, except Kemp will want there to be a D in the White House), but a brand new candidate seeking to replace Isakson...who knows.

Of course, the flip may happen so quickly that playbooks won't even matter. It doesn't matter whether Democrats Republicans nominate a moderate or a conservative, focus on rural areas or suburban areas, or engage in turnout or persuasion in a state like VA. The first prominent GOP statewide candidate in GA to lose will also likely be the last GOP candidate to win; that's why staving off any Democratic victories in GA for as long as possible is important for the GOP, and why they have to focus on persuasion (and therefore the suburbs) above all else.

[Adam Griffin]

^^^ This more or less says it all about how Perdue and the GAGOP feel, and how they're going to approach it:

Perdue said he thinks he’ll be able to win back some of those suburban voters. He argued that Trump hardly campaigned in Georgia during the presidential race, and Brian Kemp, the GOP governor, didn’t message to them, instead focusing on rural Republican turnout after emerging late from a primary runoff. Democrats flipped one suburban Atlanta House district and only narrowly lost in a second. But Perdue plans to target suburban voters rather than just ceding them to Democrats.

“They only heard one side of this argument in ’16, and they only heard one side of the argument in ’18,” Perdue said. “They’ll hear both sides of the argument in ’20.”

“He has worked the Atlanta suburbs over his tenure and continues to work them very hard,” said GOP Rep. Rob Woodall, who is retiring next year from his suburban Atlanta district after a surprisingly narrow victory in 2018. “While the governor’s race had a Republican rural strategy, David is working in every corner of the state to make sure he’s turning out the vote.”

I'd also argue that Handel has never been the most popular GOP candidate in GA, and Woodall specifically was a lazy guy who didn't even begin campaigning in earnest until he was already in substantial danger (and I imagine a huge part of why he's dropping isn't because he thinks it's unwinnable - though it probably is - but because he's lazy and doesn't want to put in the work). Perdue would have done better than Handel, Woodall and Kemp had he been on the 2018 ballot in these places.

[Adam Griffin]

Ultimately, the odds I think are as follows:

Both win > Trump loses/Perdue wins > Both lose > Trump wins/Perdue loses

It's also possible in some remote universe that Trump wins and Perdue loses, even though Trump gets a lower vote share (whether that be through a higher third-party vote share in the presidential, or Perdue botching a runoff).

Perdue is more likely to carry Trump over the finish line than vice-versa, but Perdue of course doesn't want what is already a millstone around his neck to become an even greater liability by depressing base support, turnout and dollars. I doubt he's going to go out of his way to say anything publicly rebuking the President, but that's probably the best hole through which to thread the needle in a state like GA. I don't see him gaining anything in net terms via virtue-signaling like Heller or Manchin. It's all about avoiding land-mines on both sides of the fence.

That Politico article was surprisingly transparent in terms of showing his thought process & campaign strategy:

“Republicans have made a mistake in the past by running away from this president. I don’t see any need to do that,” Perdue, the first-term Georgia senator, said in an interview. “I support this agenda. I don’t support everything he says or how he says it, but this agenda is working.”

Those 3 sentences are probably the most succinct way to summarize his thoughts - and probably the most effective strategy when dealing with the Trump effect in GA.