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Georgia governors rarely get serious primary challenges for reelection. So when they do, it’s important to stop and ask what the challenge is really about.
The last time an incumbent governor in Georgia lost a primary for reelection was 99 years ago, when Gov. Thomas Hardwick lost to fellow Democrat Clifford Walker after just a single, two-year term.
Hardwick, the incumbent, was a known quantity in Georgia politics when he was elected governor in 1920, having been a congressman and U.S. senator before that.
After being supported by the Ku Klux Klan in Georgia to get elected, Hardwick flipped and became an outspoken critic of the Klan once he was governor.
He also pushed through a number of changes you’d call progressive for their day. He appointed 87-year-old Rebecca Felton to the U,S. Senate for a single day, making her the first first female senator in American history. He also signed an executive order to ban inmate beatings in Georgia prisons.
But opposing the Klan was the decision he paid for.
Charles Bullock, a political science professor at the University of Georgia and an expert in nearly all things Georgia politics, said that Hardwick’s decision to break with the Klan cost him his election in 1922 to a fellow Democrat who was backed by the Klan.
“The Klan at the time was very, very powerful and his opponent, Walker, was a member of the Klan,” Bullock said. “He came out against them because of the violence associated with the Klan.”
It would be another 80 years, including about 30 when state law didn’t allow for a second term, until Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes lost his reelection to Sonny Perdue, a Republican.
A number of factors played into Barnes’ defeat, but staffers for Barnes at the time will tell you the biggest damage came from his 2001 push to change the state flag and begin the process of removing the Confederate battle emblem that has been embedded in it since 1956.
Nearly two decades after Barnes, and a century after Hardwick, Gov. Brian Kemp now finds himself under attack facing not one, but two serious challenges to his reelection.
Although nobody loves to cover the spectacle of a political brawl more than I do, it’s important to pause to consider why this governor is facing a challenge from inside his own ranks. And the simple answer is: Donald Trump.
As with nearly everything Trump does, the former president has left little unsaid about the complete contempt for Kemp he has held since the governor sidestepped Trump’s demands to block certification of Joe Biden’s win in the state.
“The governor has done nothing. He’s done absolutely nothing. I’m ashamed that I endorsed him,” Trump said in a Fox News interview in November of 2020 as his team in Georgia continued its legal challenges in the state.
A month later, with his defeat in Georgia confirmed by a count, a recount, and a signature audit, Trump Tweeted. “@BrianKempGA should resign from office. He is an obstructionist who refuses to admit that we won Georgia, BIG! Also won the other Swing States.”
Trump headed to Dalton, Ga., shortly after that for a rally ahead of the Jan. 5 Senate runoffs. Although Trump was technically there to talk about the senators, he had much more to say about Kemp, who had not even been invited.
“I’m going to be here in a year and a half and I’m going to be campaigning against your governor and your crazy secretary of state,” Trump said to the roar of the MAGA crowd.
Promises made, promises kept, as Trump likes to say.
After months of Trump teasing David Perdue as a possible challenger to Kemp, Perdue finally announced his primary campaign against Kemp this week for 2022.
As soon as he announced his plans, the former senator began to immediately frame the race as about something more than the last election. In his announcement video, he slammed Kemp for “caving to Stacey Abrams” and promised to eliminate the state income tax, take charge of the schools, and save Georgia and Abrams and the “woke left.”
In an interview with Doug Collins, Perdue said the party was divided because of Kemp and he couldn’t stand by and watch Abrams take over Georgia. “I like Brian,” Perdue offered.
But Donald Trump is under no such illusions. He doesn’t like Brian. And the next election is only about the last election.
If you haven’t heard Trump discussing the 2020 elections recently, you should take a moment to tune in.
Instead of simply calling it a fraud, he now calls it, “the crime of the century.” He frequently sends out statements about the 2020 election, for no obvious reason.
Perdue is just the latest Georgian, and one of dozens of candidates across the country, whom Trump has endorsed solely based on their role in the 2020 elections — and his belief they would make it go better the next time around.
Because Georgia governors are so powerful, it’s nearly impossible to defeat the man in office without an overarching change happening in the state at the same time.
Governors Hardwick and Barnes both lost their races, in large part, after they pushed the state to move forward, instead of holding on to the past.
Likewise for Brian Kemp, it will be a declaration by GOP voters about whether they’re more focused on the future, or sticking with Donald Trump and the past.
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