CUMMING, Georgia. – Outgoing President Donald Trump is throwing one grenade after another at the Georgia Senate’s big contests in the last few days before Tuesday’s election.
And it is not clear who will be the victims of their explosions.
First was his refusal to accept defeat in the 2020 elections, which clouded his party’s message here about the need to keep the Senate in the hands of the Republicans. He then blamed Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., For refusing to pass $ 2,000 stimulus checks, forcing Senator David Perdue and Senator Kelly Loeffler to switch positions on the issue. to align with him.
He too described the “Republican Senate” as “pathetic” for rejecting its demands to repeal an Internet liability law known as Section 230 in a vote on a military bill that Perdue and Loeffler lost.
On Friday, Trump falsely claimed that the entire 2020 election in Georgia, including the two Senate races, was “illegal and invalid”. On Saturday, Trump again cast doubt on the legitimacy of the state’s electoral system.
His recent series of tweets came moments after Loeffler urged rally attendees in this Atlanta suburb to vote and urge people they know across the state to vote.
“We have to hold the line,” she said. “We are the barrier to stop socialism in America.”
The impact of the Trump bomb launch is unpredictable in the highly polarized environment of a competitive state and an election out of the year. His bizarre claims appear to have energized voters from both parties and, with polls showing both disputes, it is unclear which side will come out on top. Trump is expected to appear at a rally for Perdue and Loeffler on Monday night in Dalton City.
The second round on Tuesday will shape President-elect Joe Biden’s administration. If Democrats win both seats, they will take control of the Senate and set the agenda. If at least one of the two Republican candidates wins, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Will have a pocket veto on Biden’s legislative agenda, senior management and court nominations.
“Tuesday is everything. Tuesday is everything,” said Jon Ossoff, the Democratic candidate facing Perdue, at a campaign stop on Stone Mountain outside Atlanta. “And the work you are doing today to mobilize the community to go out and vote will make a difference.”
As Ossoff has a busy schedule, Perdue was forced out of the campaign, saying on Thursday that he will be quarantined after entering “close contact” with a member of his team who has Covid-19. He hopes to miss the Trump rally on Monday, he told Fox News.
Rich McCormick, the 2020 Republican nominee for this city’s congressional district who narrowly lost to a Democrat, said “there is a danger” that Trump’s attacks on Republicans who run the Senate could hurt Perdue and Loeffler politically.
“His ability to excite people was what elected him,” McCormick told reporters after appearing at a rally here with Loeffler and Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas. “He’s trying to get people who would normally show up just for him to show up for them, and I think that’s a good thing.”
The disputes in Georgia were placed in more uncertainty on Saturday after 11 Republican senators announced they would reject voters from certain states unless a commission is established to investigate election results – part of a last-ditch effort by Trump’s allies to overthrow the election result.
The Jan. 6 attempt is virtually guaranteed to fail, as the senators acknowledged in a joint statement. Perdue’s term will have expired by then, regardless of the outcome of the election, so he will not participate. Loeffler declined to say how he will vote, telling reporters that “everything is on the table now” and promising “to continue fighting for this president”.
Her Democratic rival, Raphael Warnock, attacked her.
“We continue to reach new lows. This is outrageous and it is outrageous that Georgia’s unelected senator, Kelly Loeffler, is not defending the voices of the people in Georgia,” Warnock told CNN. “We have a democratic system. And the four most powerful words are: the people spoke.”
The effort to block the counting of some electoral votes won by President-elect Joe Biden has been criticized by several Republicans, including Senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Senator Mitt Romney for Utah. McConnell urged Republican senators not to participate in the effort.
Later on Saturday, Trump marked McConnell in a tweet urging Congress to approve payments of $ 2,000, quoting a Republican pollster who said they are popular. Once again, it weakened the Republican Party’s message about Senate control.
McCormick described Trump as the political equivalent of a character played by Adam Sandler in a popular 1996 film.
“He’s like Happy Gilmore in golf. He’s the guy who shouldn’t be there, who has an incredible number of unorthodox followers,” said McCormick. “Here is this guy who can just drive the long ball, but suddenly he is real. And he wins.”
Stacey Khizder and Julia Jester contributed.