Horror in Texas, Results in Georgia
Hello Hackaroos,
We know you share our complete horror at the gun massacre in Texas yesterday. We talk below about the politics of the aftermath as well as the primary results last night in Georgia, Texas and Alabama. We are not feeling too jovial today, so let’s just get to it.
Let’s begin…
Guns. Will anything change?
MURPHY: We both know the entrenched politics of guns in American politics. A majority want new action; background checks, assault weapons bans, red flag laws. Proposals exist (and I’d add a large Australian style paid buyback program), laws are ready but the gridlock of gun politics remains. A vocal minority has, at least to date, the power to block legislation. Will that change now? Cynics will say no, but I think there is a chance. But it will not happen without a huge fight. We need pressure like never before on DC. Senate Leader Schumer should start a slow boil; a future date for a vote on both background checks and a red flag law. Then build up to it with hearings and – I’d suggest – a Million Parent March on DC. Enough. This needs to be a huge political fight with record pressure on both parties for action.
GIBBS: I agree, Mike. If this is a quick up or down vote then it’s almost certainly not likely to produce any real results. Frankly, if anything is going to change the politics of this, then you’d think it would be the tragic incidents of the last few weeks and the sheer horror of it all. We’ve been here before though and nothing changed. To me, it’s the quiet meetings that will happen now that give us the best chance for change. Do people who know they can’t solve all of this try to make some of it better and reach across the aisle to start a conversation? My God, let’s hope so. The bar, it seems, is something like the red flag law that has helped in Florida and was instituted after the Parkland shooting that allows law enforcement to intervene and take temporarily the guns from a person who could harm themselves or others. The time for moments of silence, thoughts and prayers or describing these events as “unimaginable” is long over. We can imagine them because they happen all too often and hopefully common sense action can make even a small difference in protecting the lives of innocent Americans.
The Night The Lights Finally Went Out in Georgia… for David Perdue and the Orange Menace
MURPHY: Huge loss for Trump in Georgia, his most important and most targeted race this year. Gov. Brian Kemp crushed Trump’s candidate – former Senator David Perdue – in a landslide. This despite Trump Inc. pouring a full endorsement, $3 million and endless social media noise into the race. In what many would call an even bigger upset Hero Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger also defeated Trump cat’s paw Rep Jody Hice. (Many observers expected a tight runoff). A Trump backed candidate for Attorney General also got smashed by incumbent Chris Carr. The bottom line? Conservatives that Trump works against can still win and win big, but the key is to take away Trump’s energy on key GOP grassroots issues. That means messages about issues GOP primary voters care about; Joe Biden’s economic failures, the border and crime. This tactic reduces Trump to whining about “stolen elections” and his own petty grievances. When that happens Trump sounds like a crazy person ranting at a bus stop; and GOP base voters just shake their head, get on the bus and drive away. You can bet plenty of potential 2024 Republican Presidential candidates took notice of the results yesterday. It is a powerful moment inside the GOP. It doesn’t dethrone Trump as a powerful force inside the party, but the Emperor now has far fewer clothes.
GIBBS: Yeah, an embarrassing night for Perdue and Trump. Even Trump couldn’t say this vote was rigged, the margins were so in Kemp’s favor. Credit where credit is due, Murphy. Last week, when faced with a poll showing him down 30 points, Perdue “guaran-damn-teed” he wouldn’t lose by that and he was right – he lost by more than 50!
For Trump, the lesson he’s unlikely to learn is the one you point out, Mike. He’s tried the “my election was stolen” message now in Georgia more than anywhere else and the ballot results are clear: he’s lost two U.S. Senate races, a Governor’s race, an Attorney General’s race, and fittingly, the Secretary of State’s race. That’s right, zero out of five. People just aren’t buying it in Georgia and for good reason.
Now, we turn to the main event and ask whether Stacy Abrams has a chance? I think she does, though, make no mistake, this is a terrible political environment for her and other Dems. She lost a close race in 2018 when the political winds were at her back, so this will be tough. She, though, is a big-time political talent. She’s spent years working and organizing the grassroots and building the machinery needed to win a big, yet close, race. Kemp is still the favorite and he ran a great campaign to absolutely crush Perdue and Trump.
MURPHY: I think Abrams picked the wrong job to run for in the wrong year. It’s possible she’ll win the general, but if I had to bet I’d take Kemp in the general with 2-1 odds. One interesting Georgia note; turnout yesterday was big by primary standards. While I detest many aspects of the new GA voting law, so far the wild-eyed CW that it would cripple voting has been completely wrong. We need to carefully watch the general election to know the full story, but to date it appears the law is actually backfiring; driving more voters to the polls, not less. The WaPo had a good story on this.
GIBBS: Well Murphy, I think people are generally reaching the wrong conclusion about the Georgia laws. We’ve decided that if we cut the number of fire exits in the movie theater and the theater catches on fire, if people still get out of the burning movie theater, we say, “See, that was fine.” The whole law was set up under the guise that Kemp needed to do something to pretend like he was being moderately responsive to Donald Trump's disinformation about voter fraud. It’s crazy to make it harder to pick our leaders but it’s where we are in Georgia. Let’s just not congratulate ourselves too much on this one.
MURPHY: Meanwhile some other big primary night news. In Alabama, loutish Congressman Mo Brooks limped into a run-off in the Senate primary against front-runner Katie Britt. Trump had backed Brooks, but quickly ran for the tall grass when Britt’s campaign – with the strong help of Alabama political muscle man Sen. Richard Shelby – started to surge. Trump loyalty is a one -way street. Now Britt (and Shelby) are likely to dispatch Brooks in the runoff, but we’ll know for sure when the final votes are counted. In Texas, incumbent (and scandal plagued) Attorney General Ken Paxton beat Land Commissioner George P. Bush in the runoff by an impressive 2-1 margin. Bush had, awkwardly, courted Trump but the Orange won predictably opted to support Paxton. So Texas provides Trump with his sole win of an otherwise disastrous night.
GIBBS: Trump finally got on the scoreboard last night with Paxton. And, speaking of Texas, in a very closely watched race, incumbent Rep. Henry Cuellar, a pro-life moderate, beat Bernie-backed progressive Jessica Cisneros by just 175 votes. This one went back and forth for most of the night. Interestingly, the vote totals aren’t too different from the primary race to the runoff and the abortion draft decision that leaked from the Supreme Court didn’t seem to make a big difference here as some thought it might. This district, though, is worth keeping an eye on because it’s a likely tossup race in November. The debate about moderates vs. progressives lives on in another close election.
MURPHY: Cuellar is a good example of how an incumbent with deep roots in his district is very hard to beat. The race is too close to call, but if Cisneros loses it’ll be yet another primary setback for Team Proggie (though to be fair they did OK in PA last week). The GOP is making a big play for this seat in the general election and if Cuellar hangs in, the odds the Democrats hold it do significantly improve.
The Keystone State Gets Its Recount…
MURPHY: Meanwhile, the drama continues in Pennsylvania where Dr. Oz has now officially "won" the race by 902 votes, with the Acting Secretary of State Leigh Chapman about to issue a formal recount. We are in funhouse mirror territory now; McCormick is making a legal move to allow some undated absentee ballots to be counted. That’s the legally solid position, since all ballots are stamped so those where people didn’t write the ballot, well, it doesn’t matter. But the RNC – looking to rescue Trump’s shaky primary record as of late – has raced in to join Oz’s campaign and say those ballots should not be counted. The NRSC is silent, but as the GOP Senate Campaign Committee, I’d bet dollars to donuts that they are hoping for McCormick to get those Abs counted; the last, slim hope that the theoretically more electable McCormick prevails in the primary.
GIBBS: Count me as someone very confused about how Republicans decide when, where and how to count certain ballots or not. Fairly sure they don’t know either!
TIDBITS:
MURPHY: Speaking of not ending well for anyone, how about those New York Democrats? Josh Kraushaar has a great column on the how New York actually now has a pretty fair map. Not that the Democrats are at all happy about it!
GIBBS: Like I said the last time we had this debate Murphy, we just don't do gerrymandering in blue states as well as you guys do in red ones!
MURPHY: Finally in the Clown Car department, several leading Michigan Gubernatorial candidates screwed up their candidate petitions (they need 15K legit voter signatures to get on the ballot) and have been knocked off the primary ballot by the Secretary of State. A total train wreck since polls show Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is highly vulnerable. To prove God has a wicked sense of humor, one of the candidates with a bunch of faulty ballot petitions is self-funding business tycoon Perry Johnson who is running as the “man who invented quality control.” You cannot make this stuff up. It seems these candidates used shady paid circulators to gather these sigs and the level of fraud and incompetence (same handwriting on name after name, etc) is truly epic. The whole thing was uncovered by wily Democratic war horse Mark Brewer. Second tier candidate Tudor Dixon is likely to move up now (potentially along with car dealer Kevin Rinke). Dixon is charismatic and comfortable in Maga-land; she may well become the Michigan version of Kristi Noem. Net-net, this world class screw up is a bit of welcome good news for Governor Whitmer.
We’ll see you on Friday!
Murphy and Gibbs