Sep.08

electoral-vote.com

Dem 51

Ties 3

GOP 46

A Campaign Gone Wrong

The Wall Street Journal is owned by Rupert Murdoch, and is generally regarded as right-leaning. That is a pretty apt descriptor of the paper's editorial pages. However, the paper's reporters definitely did not get the message, as they keep pumping out pieces that will gladden the hearts of Democrats.

There was, first of all, the piece about John Fetterman (see above), who is not well-loved by most members of the Democratic Party, to say the least. There was also a story yesterday about Corey Lewandowski, reporting that he and Kristi Noem were de facto co-DHS Secretaries during her tenure, despite the fact that she was Senate-confirmed and he was not. This isn't much of a surprise, as he was clearly much more involved in running DHS than an unpaid advisor (his official role) would be, and since this administration regularly grants people power to which they are not legally entitled (see DOGE; Kushner, Jared; Witkoff, Steve; etc.).

Also published in the Journal yesterday was an article headlined "The GOP Senate Campaign Gone Disastrously Wrong in Georgia." It is, of course, about Rep. Mike Collins (R-GA), who is doing everything possible to lose his attempt to unseat Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) in November.

Their laundry list of issues with Collins' campaign is really quite substantive; it could well be a future case study in a class called "Politics 101: What Not to Do." A brief rundown:

• Collins started his campaign with a much-derided video that decreed "GEORIGA [sic], LET'S RIDE." Remarkably, the video was never removed from the campaign's Twitter feed, despite all the mockery directed at it.
  
  
• Collins has flip-flopped on some key issues, most obviously whether or not the 2020 election results were legitimate. MAGA voters, who control the primaries, want to hear that 2020 was fake news. But Georgia voters in general do not like election denialism. The problem is that this is not an issue where there's middle ground, and Collins struggled to switch gears once he had the nomination in hand.
  
  
• Collins is as bad a fundraiser as Ken Paxton (R) over in Texas, and has been outraised 10-to-1 by Ossoff. Plus, Ossoff didn't have to spend his money to win a contentious primary; Collins did.
  
  
• Collins' campaign has been beset by scandals. In particular, reporters dug up overtly white nationalist statements from both his son-in-law and a now-former senior staffer. Those things will turn off the moderate Republicans and independents whose votes Collins so badly needs, while at the same time could motivate Black voters to get to the polls to vote for Ossoff. There are Black Georgians still living who can remember being represented in the Senate by a bigot like Herman Talmadge (who left office in 1981).

As a result of these problems, not to mention Ossoff running a very skilled campaign, Collins is getting crushed in the polls, trailing by an average of about 8%. Equally important is that five of the six aggregators have Ossoff above 50%. That is, of course, the promised land. And the sixth has Ossoff at 49.2%, which is right on the cusp of the promised land, despite nearly 10% of respondents being undecided.

Collins has only two slim hopes right now. The first is that the polling is wrong. This is possible; we all know what happened in Michigan and Wisconsin earlier this year. However, it is not probable. There's no curve ball, like candidates dropping in and out, or somewhat-fringy frontrunners, in this race. Also, it's probably the most heavily polled Senate race in the nation, so we're not talking about just two or three polls.

The second slim hope is that Collins can keep Ossoff under 50%. That would, of course, force a runoff under Georgia law, one that would take place in early December. In the winter cold, with a wonky electorate, anything could happen. Ossoff himself first won the seat in such an election, though do keep in mind he was on the same ballot as a Black colleague, Raphael Warnock. This helped get Democrats, and in particular Black Democrats, out to the polls. The same might not happen if it's just Ossoff all by himself.

As you might guess, we think these are both long shots. And, more importantly, the Republican pooh-bahs might soon decide they are long shots (if they have not already done so). The GOP has to play defense in so many places this year, it cannot afford to waste financial and other resources on lost causes. So, it may already be too late for Collins to right the ship. And if it's not already too late, it will be soon. If the Republican cavalry does not, in fact, ride to the rescue, then Collins will have to win on his own, which is not something he's shown that he can do. (Z)