It’s worth noting that, in Georgia, the voters remain restive — and unwilling to simply follow the commands of the Establishment.
Another primary Tuesday came and went across America, and the results for the GOP were so exciting that you’re only reading my thoughts about them now. The results across most states on Tuesday were resoundingly yawners — there’s nothing to report of interest in Alabama’s Senate runoff or Oklahoma’s gubernatorial primary (which heads to an August runoff), and for a while there was nothing to report at all from Washington, D.C., which somehow manages to report votes more slowly than California despite being the size of a torn postage stamp.
Yet something strange happened in the state of Georgia (or “GEORIGA,” as new GOP Senate nominee Mike Collins calls it in his latest digital advertising). The Senate primary runoff went as expected, with Collins (a Trump-endorsed “2020 truther,” which is a particularly sore point in Georgia for reasons which need not be rehearsed once more here) defeating Derek Dooley for the privilege of bravely and futilely sacrificing himself to incumbent Jon Ossoff, who threatens to turn into the Susan Collins of Georgia despite the fact that he never should have won in the first place.
But the GOP runoff for the governor’s slot went fairly haywire, and in ways worth noting. In the first round of voting, Lieutenant Governor Burt Jones finished first with 38.4 percent of the vote to self-funding billionaire businessman Rick Jackson’s 32.5 percent. But on Tuesday night, Jackson leapfrogged Jones and won the nomination 52.6-47.4. This was a particular surprise to observers not only because Jones was a veteran of Georgia politics, but because he was endorsed by the biggest powerbrokers in Georgia politics: President Donald Trump and Governor Brian Kemp. (That these two do not often agree on political endorsement strategy is a fact long noted.)
It availed Jones not a whit. I am almost completely unfamiliar with Georgia state politics — one reason why this is brief — but it’s easy enough to see how Rick Jackson’s appeal simply overwhelmed any endorsements: Jackson had an irresistible personal biography that made him the perfect outsider candidate. Born into poverty and never knowing his father, he was raised by an alcoholic mother until he entered foster-care at age 13. Now he’s a billionaire who founded a medical recruiting business. Needless to say, Georgia Republicans love these sorts of candidates, and general-election voters often do as well. Jackson’s outsider status only helps in this environment, and this is one race the GOP won’t have to spend its own money on. In all honesty, he seems a strong candidate to win against the odious and slightly farcical Keisha Lance Bottoms, certainly as strong as the slightly anonymous Burt Jones.
So while I wouldn’t make much of the Georgia Republican primary electorate bucking both its president and its governor, it’s worth noting that the voters remain restive — and unwilling to simply follow the commands of the Establishment.