It’s all-out war in the Georgia Senate runoff this week, entirely on the Republican side. Republican Herschel Walker’s campaign has become a proxy battleground in the Trump/Rick Scott faction versus Mitch McConnell civil war. Oh, and it’s become fodder for Republican graft and grift, because they’re never going to pass up a chance to make a buck.
The factions are openly sniping at each other on Twitter and in the press. Rick Scott ally Curt Anderson tweeted Tuesday, “Watched Monday Night Football here in Georgia last night, and the evening news. Schumer’s superpacs running tons of ads attacking Walker. McConnell’s superpac running zero ads attacking Warnock. Have they given up?”
Steven Law, the guy who heads up McConnell’s Super PAC, the Senate Leadership Fund, fired back, mocking how puny Scott’s NRSC ad buys are and adding, “But don’t worry little buddy—we’re used to covering for you.”
Now is a great time to capitalize on the Republican disarray and put Warnock over the top on Dec. 6. Please give $10, $20, $50, or whatever you can to help him make the most out of the GOP civil war.
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Meanwhile, Walker’s campaign is begging all the Republicans to please stop using it to line their own pockets. “We need everyone focused on winning the Georgia Senate race, and deceptive fundraising tactics by teams that just won their races are siphoning money away from Georgia,” Walker’s campaign manager, Scott Paradise, said Monday. “This is the last fight of 2022, and every dollar will help,” Paradise said. “The companies and consultants raising money off this need to cut it out.”
That includes Trump’s Save America PAC that sent out an email telling donors “contribute ANY AMOUNT IMMEDIATELY to the Official Georgia Runoff Fundraising Goal and increase your impact by 1200%.” If donors didn’t see the link that gave them more details and allowed them to edit the allocation of their donation, 90% of it went to Trump, and just 10% to Walker. Once that became public, the PAC changed the allocation to 50-50. But it wasn’t just Trump—everyone’s been getting in on the act from the North Carolina Republican Party and newly elected GOP senators J.D. Vance (OH) and Ted Budd (NC). Even loser Mehmet Oz got in on it. These committees were also defaulting to the 90/10 fundraising ratio until it was revealed in the press.
It’s not as if the Walker campaign doesn’t have enough problems on its own. Namely the candidate. In case you missed it, here’s his extended riff—in what is supposed to be a stump speech—on staying up late to watch horror movies and the merits of being a werewolf as opposed to a vampire.
But it’s not just Scott, McConnell, and werewolves. The big monster in the room is Trump, who bigoted his way into the campaign by making it all about his lackluster announcement of a third presidential bid. “I think it’s going to hurt Walker’s chances,” Jason Shepherd, former chair of the Cobb County Republican Party, told Politico. “I really wish that he had waited until after this runoff was over before announcing. There’s really no reason he had to get out this early, especially with the focus being on Georgia.”
It has made for pretty great campaign ad fodder for Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, though.
We can’t count on the Three Stooges of the GOP to keep Walker down, however. He’s got Gov. Brian Kemp’s GOTV machine and the full weight of the GOP voter suppression laws fighting in his favor.
That includes the really short time frame for this election, and the GOP establishment's efforts to cut out critical days of early voting. That’s still being fought in the courts, but as of now, we have to assume that polls won’t be open on Saturday, Nov. 26. Warnock needs all the help we can give him to get his voters out and keep the campaign fueled.
Georgia’s runoff election is Tuesday, Dec. 6. There’s still plenty of time to get out the vote for an actual politician with a proven record, the incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock. Check out Daily Kos’ GOTV page to find out how to help.
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