Battleground Georgia: David Perdue Declares for Governor

CLAY: One of the big battlegrounds, maybe the biggest battleground, frankly, in all of America in the midterms, if you consider Reverend Raphael Warnock going head-to-head with Herschel Walker in the Senate race and also now Stacey Abrams has decided to run to attempt to beat Governor Brian Kemp or David Perdue, the former senator who now is going to be running for the governorship in the state of Georgia.

David Perdue went on and said Stacey Abrams is not interested in Georgia, this is about being president, which is kind of what we hinted at when we were discussing Kamala and what in the world is going to end up happening with her. Let’s play cut 5 here of David Perdue who is now a candidate in the contested Republican primary in Georgia.

PERDUE: I got in very simply to stop Stacey Abrams and save our state. It’s a sad state of affairs that our current governor has lost the confidence of many Republicans, but I’m excited. This has been a great day since our announcement this morning this is my first interview and — as you said — just a few minutes ago Donald Trump has given us his full endorsement in our campaign. She wants to transform our state into another failed state like California. You heard all that news about San Francisco just now. That’s what she wants to bring to Georgia, and I’m gonna stand in the breach and make sure she never does that.

BUCK: Perdue is gonna be formidable, Clay. I think his point also is larger there than just Georgia, because when you look at every blue states right now and the trajectory of — and, I mean, very blue, right? I’m not talking about Virginia. I’m not talking about places there are pretty mixed. A very, very blue state. It’s getting worse, it’s getting more expensive, it’s getting more dangerous, and people are leaving, right?

The Democrat brand nationally at the state level right now is clearly that, and the state of Georgia is an opportunity for that to stop, right, to stop the Democrats ruining yet another place that has so much going for it but if only they can avoid the failed ideas. Whether we’re talking about crime or economic development or just the general socialist impulse of the Democrat Party that’s been on display in recent years, Georgia could be a place where we actually gain some real ground in this midterm, Clay — and it needs to happen as well, because losing those two Senate seats was inexcusable on the Republican side. Inexcusable.

CLAY: And look. Stacey Abrams, if she loses back-to-back governor races in Georgia — and remember, she refused to concede, so she became a hero of the left by refusing to concede a race that she lost by a pretty substantial margin, way more than the dividing race in the state of Georgia between Trump and Biden.