Brian Robinson Says Perdue Can’t Replicate 2014 or Kemp Strategy for Re-Election
What will it take for Senator David Perdue to be reelected? Not being a Trump-like candidate in a fast-trending Democratic state says Brian Robinson.
As part of his weekly appearance on WABE’s “Political Breakfast”, Robinson said last Friday the then-ongoing shutdown would give Senator Perdue the opportunity to present himself in a new light to voters. Fmr. Gov. Deal’s deputy chief of staff outlined a relatively bleak electoral outlook for Perdue (starting around 36:40).
There’s no transcript but some quotes I quickly grabbed from Robinson start off with a great caveat emptor: “Every time I say it–Democrats are over sampled in Georgia and every time I am right.”
He continued:
David Perdue can not replicate the Kemp winning formula. The numbers won’t work again. Perdue has got to bring back the Republicans we lost in the 6th, 7th and 11th Congressional Districts. He’s got to go get those people. Karen Handel lost but she got 17,000 more votes than Kemp did.
That’s that swing Republican voter and Perdue can talk to them by being seen as a problem solver.
The problem solving proposed was in light of the then-ongoing government shutdown, which, if our thoughts and prayers work we get to do all over again!
Anyway, Robinson says it will be imperative for Perdue to find a new political tack next year:
With Sen. Perdue being on the ballot in 2020 he has a unique opportunity here. The Georgia he will face is a more Democratic state than the one he faced in 2014 and it is trending fast in that direction.
The Democrats are putting forward more and more serious candidates for these offices. Stacey Abrams is very serious.
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Perdue a problem solver? Hasn’t been yet. I’m surprised he can stand up straight with all the Trumpwater he’s been carrying.
He better limber up though because trying to re-frame himself as some sort of centrist problem solver is going to take some Olympic-class gyrations.
Rumors all over twitter that Stacey Abrams was offered the SOTU response as long as she committed to that Senate race.
This is quite funny coming from the genius that is Brian Robinson. If his former boss, Deal, hadn’t been all pissy with Tom Price during the 2010 redistricting process the 6th district would still be a republican seat. Take all of solid republican Cherokee county away from the 6th then add 100,000 democrats in Brookhaven and DeKalb. The loss of the 6th district is squarely on the shoulders of Deal, Chris Riley and Brian Robinson for their pettiness.
Now, to 2020. Perdue can win and there is a very clear path to his victory. White educated women in the northern suburbs most be brought back into the republican fold. If the state party and county parties like Fulton and Cobb don’t get their act together they are destined to lose again. There is no off season in politics. You have to be constantly registering people to vote. Knocking on doors and providing a consistent message. These party officials got lazy. Get rid of them all and get people that want to work.
If I was Perdue or worked for him. I am neither. I would be at every single Saturday morning breakfast in Cobb, Fulton, Gwinnett and Forsyth trying to figure out the workers in the party from the worthless hanger-ons. Then I would work to get those folks to lead those county parties this cycle.
I would also hand select who I wanted for state party chair and work to get that nonworthless person elected.
What are the odds the Fulton and Cobb GOPs get their respective acts together?
While going to breakfast clubs is a start, Perdue probably needs to tone down his Trump-hugging as well. He doesn’t need to pull a Jeff Flake or Bob Corker, but it would behoove him to stop being the first Senator willing to step in front the scandal du jour.
No. I don’t think that Fulton and Cobb with get their act together for 2020. To change you have to understand what went wrong. I don’t think they know or care to know what went wrong. It’s someone else’s problem or someone else’s fault in their minds.
I don’t think the average voter sees Perdue as a Trump lover or just a regular republican. I promise you that the vast majority of voters in Georgia don’t know that he recently had lunch with the President or see him as constantly defending the President. The people who know that right now either love Perdue for doing it or hated him anyway. Regular/Normal voters aren’t paying attention yet. Perdue has plenty of time to define himself to those voters.
Bottom line to me is that Perdue is still living in the 20th century and the voters that are going to matter to him are not. He’s not going to change and they will see that, especially if he’s running against a strong candidate like Stacey Abrams.
It’s possible to beat Perdue. Especially if the state party and county republican parties remain lazy. The democrats haven’t been lazy lately. Republicans have forgotten how to work and do the grassroots efforts needed to continue to win.
“White educated women in the northern suburbs most be brought back into the republican fold
So let’s see… what is important to white, educated, suburban women?
Perdue:
– opposes gun control
– opposes the ACA
– supported withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement
– Couldn’t recall whether Prez Trump said “sh*thole nations” at a meeting he was at
– Apparently still believes in “trickle-down” economics
Is he going to “soften his position” on these?
I guess you could say it worked for Kemp. But the old “fool me once…” phrase comes to mind.
Let me rephrase my original post.
Former republican voting white educated women in the northern suburbs most be brought back into the republican fold. That is what I meant.
Perdue has to win statewide so no I would not soften anything on guns. I’d talk about school safety in general and the need to use existing laws and avenues to make sure sick people can’t get their hands on guns.
I wouldn’t change anything on ACA messaging. This administration has done everything they possibly can to stabilize the ACA marketplace. The vast majority of states are seeing no increase or very small increases this year in the ACA market place due to the work of this administration. While that is good I still support a full repeal so that people can buy the insurance that they feel is best for themselves and their family.
Yeah, no one actually cares about this that isn’t an activist. I would not address it at all. If I had to I’d say that I agree with the President that we should not put our economy at risk while other countries get a pass. I care more about jobs in Dalton Georgia and Dublin Georgia that I do in Dublin Ireland or in China.
Whether he did or didn’t say that I don’t care. I’d dodge the question too. Nothing good comes from answering it in the affirmative or negative. That’s just life. Again, voters don’t care about this either.
Allowing people to keep more of the money that they have earned by their own hard work is always a good thing and I will never shy away from my belief that people deserve to take home more of their own money. I’ll continue to fight for lower taxes for all Americans and will never apologize for that.
Agree on everything but the notion that the Trump Admin has done everything they possibly can to stabilize the ACA marketplace
After all, it was Trump who signed an executive order allowing for association health plans exempt from Obamacare EHB requirements, something that poses a long-term threat to the viability of the individual marketplace by drawing younger, healthier individuals out of the pool. This is also the administration that oversaw the elimination of the individual mandate and expansion of short-term insurance, both of which are designed to lower the amount of young, healthy individuals in the insurance pool. Last, there’s just the practical matter of doing things like shortening the enrollment period, slashing the marketing budget, and restricting the hours HealthCare.gov is available to handle sign ups during the enrollment period.
All of the things that this administration has done has allowed younger individuals to buy the insurance that best fits their needs without punishing them for simply being young.
Not to belabor it, but when you open up skimpy association plans you, in effect, weaken the individual marketplace because those plans are designed to pull young, healthy individuals out of the marketplace.
If Perdue phrases it like your most recent response, people will buy it. If he tries to pretend the GOP have been valiant defenders of the individual marketplace, people are going to say that’s his biggest lie since the time he swore his Canadian tuxedo didn’t come from Barney’s.
Yet the ACA market places have no increases or very little increase in premiums this year while still allowing young healthy individuals to buy the insurance that they feel best fits their needs.
The politics of repeal and replace is passe’, and most don’t bother to analyze the mechanics of the marketplace. I imagine most voters will judge “progress” based in singular part on the price of their premiums. I don’t know the figures in GA, but I don’t think they trended well last year, and as long as they trend towards more expensive (incl. any share of employee contributions to employer plans), the Dems will have an argument that sells. If Repubs want to take that argument away in 2020, they need to be true problem solvers and work on a bipartisan fix. I don’t know the fix, but what happened with the risk corridors and the related payments to insurers?
The risk corridors were nothing more than yet another corporate bailout. They distorted the market place and were a bad idea.
I’d imagine that presumptive Democratic nominee Stacey Abrams is going to push “Medicare for All” or some close relative of it.
Those payments were essentially not much, if anything, different than gov-backed reinsurance, or high risk pools.
But a quick look at numbers showed it was 2018 when the big jumps in prices were, in large part bc the CSR payments were withdrawn. Kaiser being the only insurer who didn’t calculate those reductions into 2018 premiums had the biggest % increases for 2019. But otherwise 2019 adjustments walked back the 2018 premium increases a bit. Still high enough that it could be a winning argument for Dems, but there is a chance for change.
If you go back and look at the coverage maps for the ACA health plans you had one insurer in large portions of the country. That has and is changing due to changes this administration (HHS / CMS) has made. Having multiple insures in the marketplace will drive down costs. Not another corporate bailout that is in the billions of dollars a year.
Or, you know, you could do a public option which provides folks with choice between a private insurer or a government plan.
I’d be fine with that as long as the public option wasn’t subsidized by the people who chose the private option. Right now a “Public option” would be medicare for all. That won’t work financially so my portion of the medicare tax would go up to pay for it. So I’m a no on that idea. If you want to see what rationing of care looks like for old people just put everyone on medicare. The day that happens is the day I start a consigner medicine business because no one will be able to get in to see a doctor that actually takes medicare.
Not sure why the public option got skipped over, and all of a sudden Medicare for all is the talking point. If the public option is no more subsidized than the current subsidies for marketplace plans, and the insureds pay enough in premiums to cover costs, then it’s a win imo. The same could be accomplished with a nonprofit insurer, but the ones envisioned by the ACA weren’t funded well-enough so failed. But if the gov could essentially just be the starting point of nonprofit insurance (could also be accomplished through a gov-chartered corporation), then I see that as the best path forward. And once there’s a viable nonprofit insurer in the marketplace, that puts legit pressure on other insurers to find ways to cut costs and premiums.
Balance, “Medicare for All” means something different depending on who you ask.
The Sanders set will tell you it’s a true single-payer system that eliminates private insurance.
Kaiser Family Foundation polling shows 71% of Americans M4A when told it guarantees health insurance as a right for all Americans. 67% approve when told it eliminates health insurance premiums and out of pocket health care costs for most Americans. 37% approve when told it would eliminate private health insurance companies.
That’s why mainline Democrats like Harris, Klobuchar, etc. support a “Medicare for All” that’s really just a public option co-existing alongside private insurance.
So, high risk pools, or reinsurance, aren’t just different forms of corporate subsidies? They, and risk corridors, are just ways to buffer or reimburse insurers for high cost claims/insureds. And if they are different, how do you explain? Because high risk pools are often touted as an alternative to the ACA’s mandatory coverage, but it’s just another way to fund high-cost/high-risk claims.
So long as we don’t punch people for being born with a major pre-existing condition or the ability to bare children either.
Even though Perdue won’t face opposition in the primary he can’t escape being tied to Trump who may be at the head of the ticket. His success or failure will be directly tied to Trump. So if Trump can replicate 2016, Perdue wins. If he can’t, both Perdues go down with him, bigly.
It worked out for Marsha Blackburn in TN.
when i get a chance, i may try to listen to this…some of the advantages perdue has over kemp however include the power of incumbency, as of now no shrouds of scandal, and likely no serious primary challenge to fight through to get to november…it’s likely but not a given that the field will be cleared for abrams’ run…
I know Brian pretty well and we do get to talk GOP strategy from time to time. We haven’t specifically discussed this race, but from Macro-GA Politics discussions my takeaway of what he was trying to say here is the following:
1) Republicans have to be competitive, and they’re going to have to compete in ways/places they may not be used to doing.
2) A rural strategy that worked for Kemp won’t work for Perdue.
3) Thus, it’s going to be critical for Perdue to fight for voters in the Atlanta suburbs. They’ll need some convincing.
In sum, I know Brian well enough to know that he expects Perdue to win, but he isn’t taking anything for granted, and knows Perdue isn’t/shouldn’t either.
I pretty much agree on 1) and 3) but on 2), since Kemp and Perdue won in pretty much the same places with pretty much the same message, why wouldn’t a similar rural strategy work in 2020? Is the demographic shift that big a factor?
Trump/Perdue will energize the rural base but the nation and state are so polarized, the question is will they drive the turnout for the opposition so much that they’re drowned in a urban/suburban blue wave. The rural base is shrinking while the urban/suburban magnets keep getting more dense. Gwinnett, Cobb, Fulton, Clayton, Henry etc are growing and getting bluer with each cycle.
I think Brian would have been well served to point out that turnout numbers are just inherently different between a midterm and a Presidential year.
Democratic turnout is going to be higher that it was in 2018. That’s the difference between a Kemp/Abrams race and a Perdue/Abrams race.
Only two numbers matter in 2020 for the GA election. 40% of the electorate needs to be POC / 27% is level of white support that a Democrat needs