Donald Trump is in Atlanta Friday to speak at the NRA convention—the first president to do so since Ronald Reagan—and to raise still more money for Karen Handel, the Republican in the June 20 run-off election for Georgia’s 6th Congressional District.
Trump’s aggressive backing of Handel, for whom he’s already sent out a fundraising email in addition to several tweets, betrays Republican nerves over the race. Though they claim to have seen the April 18 primary election, in which Democrat Jon Ossoff got 48 percent of the vote in an 18-candidate field, as a win, reality is that Republicans have held this seat for decades and its loss would concretely show what a drag Trump could be on Republicans in 2018.
Handel has tried to keep her distance from Trump while benefiting from his support, but Matthew Chapman points out that the two are closer ideologically than Handel might want to admit. They share a nasty, personal opposition to reproductive rights, of course. They’re both strong opponents of voting, at least by people in groups that lean Democratic. And Handel, like Trump, has faced ethics complaints.
So the big question for Friday is whether Handel will hug Trump as tightly as she hugs the money he raises for her, or whether she’ll take the money but keep trying to pretend she’s not trying to get to Congress to back his agenda.
Karen Handel has Donald Trump raising money for her. That’s why Jon Ossoff needs you. Can you contribute $5 to help Ossoff defeat Handel?