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WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump leaves Washington on Saturday for his first political appearance since his election loss to Joe Biden, campaigning in Georgia, where two second-round races will decide the fate of the U.S. Senate.
The president takes the stage at 7 p.m. in the southern city of Valdosta, exactly one month before the Jan.5 special election.
A little less than a month ago he was declared the loser in the presidential race.
Yet at a time when most defeated presidents would be working to polish his legacy, Trump, who has yet to give in to Biden, has barely left the White House, sending out a series of angry tweets challenging the outcome and demanding let Republicans across the country defend him. .
Biden won in Georgia by just under 12,000 votes. That result, while narrow, has been confirmed by later accounts, making a phone call Saturday from Trump to Georgia Governor Brian Kemp all the more surprising, urging him to pressure state lawmakers to overturn the result.
The stakes are high in the second round elections. Former President Barack Obama laid them out at a virtual rally Friday, saying “the special election in Georgia will ultimately determine the course of Biden’s presidency.”
If Democratic rivals Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff defeat Republican Senators Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, the Senate will be evenly split 50-50, which means that Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris will cast any decisive vote, as dictated by the Constitution. .
United States President-elect Joe Biden speaking December 4, 2020 in Wilmington, Delaware; his success once in office depends largely on two runoff elections to the United States Senate in Georgia. (Photo: AFP / Jim Watson)
The race has attracted enormous attention. One measure of the intense interest: With donations pouring in from across the country, candidates have already spent more than $ 315 million, the AdImpact website reported, a staggering figure for senatorial races.
And such prominent figures as Obama, Vice President Mike Pence, and now Trump himself are fighting to boost voter turnout.
MIXED MESSAGING
But Trump has placed himself in a difficult situation. Since Biden won the November 3 election, the president has repeatedly and baselessly attacked the US electoral system for being riddled with “fraud.”
Despite an overwhelming series of setbacks in court, the president and his lawyers have proposed wild conspiracy theories (one involving long-deceased Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez) to explain Biden’s victory.
Now analysts say it could have created a political monster, having undermined Georgia voters’ faith in the electoral system just when it needs them by January 5.
A headline from the Valdosta Daily Times summed up the conflicting sentiment among voters in the area: “Trump in Valdosta: S.Ga. Excited, Outraged by Presidential Visit.”
VIRUS REGISTRATION
Part of the “outrage” stems from the notion of another massive Trump rally on a day when the Atlanta Journal’s constitutional flag headline reads, “The state sets a record for viruses in a single day.”
Masks will be required and temperatures will be taken at the airport rally, local media reported, although public health officials say such mass gatherings always carry risks.
Trump’s ability to enthuse his supporters remains powerful, and he thrives on the campaign trail.
Vice President Mike Pence addressed this December 4, 2020 rally in Savannah, Georgia, in support of two Republicans facing a runoff with national implications. (Photo: AFP / Spencer Platt)
But some voters, even in long-time conservative Georgia, are expressing weariness at the constant drama surrounding the president.
Analysts said it could make a crucial difference if Trump, in Valdosta, simply repeats his litany of electoral complaints or instead addresses the importance of maintaining control of the Senate.
“It will be good for the rally if it’s about Perdue and Kelley Loeffler and how we have to go vote,” Spud Bowen, a Republican businessman from Tifton, Georgia, told the Valdosta Daily Times, “but I’m certainly not in the mood to hear more. insults “.
THIN LINE
Loeffler and Perdue have moved cautiously, urging Georgians to vote without directly challenging Trump’s irate complaints.
But Trump has not made it easy for Republicans in Georgia, angrily lashing out at his own party officials for his loss there, starting with Gov. Brian Kemp.
“I am ashamed to have supported him,” Trump said of Kemp, furious that the governor did not denounce Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, described by the president as an “enemy of the state,” for certifying the election.
The president telephoned Kemp early Saturday morning in what the Washington Post called a “blatant effort” to interfere with long-established elections.
The Post said Kemp, once a devoted Trump ally, had rejected the plea. His office confirmed the call, the Post said, if not its contents.
Kemp’s office previously said it would not attend Saturday’s rally, after a young Loeffler staff member and close friend of Kemp’s family, Harrison Deal, was killed in a car accident on Friday.
For Trump, 74, who is considering a new White House bid in 2024, the Georgia rally represents a gamble.
His performance there could increase his political chances, said conservative commentator Marc Thiessen.
But “if you allow Democrats to win back the Senate because you were focused on stamping out a mythical Communist conspiracy to steal the 2020 election, you will be disgraced,” Thiessen wrote in The Washington Post.
