'Nuclear explosion': GOP insiders warn Trump triggered rebellion with battleground attack
After former President Donald Trump criticized and insulted Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp during his Atlanta MAGA rally earlier this month, several GOP leaders and activists have worried that the ex-president will no longer win the Peach State in November.
According to a Politico report Monday, "That pressure has increased in recent weeks."
Like Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, the news outlet reports, "Trump has lost his strong lead in polling in Georgia since Vice President Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden atop the Democratic ticket, with Trump and Harris now effectively tied" in the battleground state.
"The Trump campaign was calling around to legislators … asking them to post positive things about the rally on social media and were being told, 'No,'" an anonymous Georgia Republican told Politico.
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In an effort to win back the voters he turned off by insulting their governor, Trump "can energize all the MAGA folks," former Nikki Haley campaign Georgia chair Eric Tanenblatt said.
"But the question is, is that enough?"
The news outlet notes that Kemp — who says he still plans to vote for Trump — "not only controls a vaunted turnout operation in Georgia but also has a track record of assembling the kind of coalition of traditionalist Republicans and independents that Trump will be counting on to carry the swing state in" the election.
"I think it’s less about the infrastructure [Trump] has. And it’s just more about the activist class — that is the segment of the activist class that is loyal to the governor — it’s completely going to either sit it out or actively hope the president loses," another Republican operative told Politico.
Per the news outlet, "This operative called Trump’s rhetorical hits against Kemp a 'nuclear explosion' that will make the race more expensive" and difficult to win.
"Forget the money and ads, the Democrats’ ground game is far surpassing the GOP ground game," the conservative commentator Erick Erickson, who is based in Georgia, wrote on X.
“They’ve been registering new voters and farming for absentee ballots with paid operatives, some of whom are making up to $40 an hour. The GOP has nothing at that level.”
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