Former Georgia state representative Vernon Jones went from being a moderate Democrat to a MAGA-loving Republican seemingly overnight; he even announced his change of parties on Jan. 6, 2021. Yes, the same day that the world was presented with a sight-and-sound exhibition of MAGA fascism and a failed coup d’etat of the U.S. government. A couple of months later, Jones made a new announcement: He would be running in the GOP primary as a challenger to Georgia’s governor Brian Kemp.
Jones' career has long been a hot mess—including rape allegations, accusations of bullying, as well as campaign contribution violations. This led to Jones jumping ship on his gubernatorial run and turning his attention toward becoming the next representative from District 10, an area of Georgia in which he does not live.
But Jones has one thing going for him: his open adoration of Donald Trump. In fact, Jones has tried to brand himself the “Black Donald Trump.” The political calculation seems to be that, with his spotty past, his one chance at gaining power is to act as the tip of the spear for Trump’s GOP in Georgia. And if he can ride Trump’s popularity in District 10, an area that Trump carried with 74% of the vote in 2020, he might win. Shortly after turning his attention away from the GOP gubernatorial race, Donald Trump gave one of his patented poorly lit video-taped endorsements for Jones.
It has been less than a month since Jones received Trump’s endorsement. Let’s see how that’s going.
On Saturday night, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Greg Bluestein reported that Mr. Jones was super unhappy emoji face about what he called GOP “poli-tricks.” The tricks were, according to Jones, a last-minute switcheroo of speaking positions between himself and GOP candidate for District 10, Mike Collins, at a Jackson County event. Mikey Collins, you might remember, is the Washington “outsider” whose dad, Mac Collins, was in Georgia’s Senate and a Georgia’s Congressperson for about 16 years. He’s the silly-billy who released a campaign video over the summer in which he exploded—with an assault rifle—a pile of papers that read “Nancy Pelosi’s Plan for America,” and another bearing the term “RINO.”
Since Jones’ announcement earlier in February, Collins has been trashing Jones in all the ways you might imagine a Republican going after a Black Republican might. Here’s an example:
In the video from last night, Jones claims that a coin was tossed to choose which candidate would speak first and which would speak last. At the last minute, he says, Collins was given the chance to speak second. Jones called this unfair because everywhere in the Peach State, when he was speaking with groups that included Collins, Collins would use the second position to trash Jones. Speaking second, Jones did not have an opportunity to rebut.
He isn’t wrong. You saw the video up above. After some back and forth, Jones left the event without giving his speech.
Thoughts and prayers.
Uh oh! It turns out that the predominantly white Republican Party in Georgia is nowhere near as interested in Trump’s “Black MAGA man” as Trump wants them to be. Now a blame game has arisen, with some in Jackson County feeling like Jones’ statement and the vagueness of how GOP events are set up has led to them taking the blame for whatever indignity may or may not have happened.
The chairman of the Jackson County Republican Party took time away from tweeting bad math to misinform the public about COVID-19 to speak with AJC: “To clarify, this was a private GOP fundraiser in Jackson County, not an official Jackson County GOP event. Local GOP chair TJ Dearman told me his organization will hold a forum for 10th [District] candidates on April 16, and will welcome all contenders with ‘open arms.’”
What happened after Jones left the event? “Outsider” Mike Collins spoke about Trump’s endorsement of Jones, saying, ”Donald Trump didn’t endorse Vernon Jones to run for Congress. He endorsed Vernon Jones to get out of that governor’s race. He wouldn’t have cared if Vernon Jones ran for dog catcher.” Teehee.