Several of Georgia’s Republican delegates say the widespread division among Democratic voters over whether President Joe Biden should seek a second term only increases the GOP’s chances of reclaiming the White House in November’s election.
The Republican National Convention starts Monday in Milwaukee, and some of those planning to nominate former President Donald Trump said they are optimistic he can recapture Georgia’s 16 electoral votes on his way back to the presidency.
“It’s certainly not helping the Democrats to be so fractured,” Cobb County GOP Chair Salleigh Grubbs said.
Grubbs, a lifelong conservative who voted for Ronald Reagan in her first election, said she’s looking forward to serving as a delegate at her first convention.
Biden is facing a growing chorus of calls to step aside following his dismal debate performance against Trump in Atlanta. Some voters have expressed concerns about his age and his chances of defeating Trump in a second election, but the president is adamant he’ll remain in the race.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution this week spoke to 50 of Georgia’s delegates to next month’s Democratic National Convention. All but two said they would back Biden’s reelection bid without hesitation.
Many said there’s too much on the line for Democrats to change course now. For example, Fulton County Commissioner Marvin Arrington Jr. said he “would vote for a piece of wood or a rock” over Trump.
Republicans, meanwhile, said they feel their party is more unified now than in either of the past two presidential election cycles. They hope to seize on that momentum going into the fall.
“There’s obviously a lot of discussions happening on the Democratic side, but we know who our nominee is,” Georgia Labor Commissioner Bruce Thompson said.
The former state senator attended the 2016 Republican convention as an alternate but said he looks forward to nominating Trump this time around as a delegate and a whip.
Though his party appears more unified, Thompson warned against Republicans becoming too complacent in the months leading up to the election.
“As a competitive individual who was involved in sports most of my life, I would never feel like we have an advantage,” Thompson said. “The fact of the matter is that it does not take long for either party to coalesce together, and it doesn’t take long for either party to divide.
Katelyn Myrick
Katelyn Myrick
“We need to stay focused on what we need to do and let the Democrats do what they need to do,” he said.
Georgia’s conservative delegates said they believe concerns over the economy and inflation will likely play out in their favor at the ballot box, along with perennial issues such as border security and America’s standing internationally.
Grubbs said it is apparent to her that even some Democrats are starting to see that Biden is not fit to be president.
“You go to an event, you look at him, you see what’s going on. You know that President Biden cannot be making all the decisions for this country,” she said. “Something is not right.”
As for the Democratic Party leaders who have decided to stick with the presumptive nominee, Grubbs said, “If they want to be fools, they can do that all day long.”
Kathleen Thorman, a former GOP chair in deep-red Gordon County, said she’s excited about the chance to make history as a delegate.
This will be her first national convention. She said she was supposed to go in 2020, but her plans were derailed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Thorman said she’s optimistic about Trump’s chances of winning the election after nearly four years of Biden in the White House.
“Is there a shift, is there a change, are people hurting after the last four years? Absolutely,” she said. “The economy matters. Inflation matters, and it’s been hard.”
The fact that Republicans appear unified behind a single nominee while the Democratic Party is in the throes of a “power struggle” can only help the GOP, Thorman said.
Grubbs said despite Georgia’s changing demographics and its recent designation as a battleground state, she believes Georgia voters are still mostly conservative.
“If you took off the labels ‘Republican’ and ‘Democrat,’ conservative values rule in Georgia,” she said.
Grubbs didn’t seem overly concerned about the former president’s legal woes either, saying Trump’s recent conviction in New York and the election interference case here in Georgia have only galvanized the GOP voters she’s talked to.
“I think people are more motivated,” she said. “If you can take the president of the United States and put him through the wringer like they have done to President Trump, it can happen to anybody.”
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