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In a party where Trump’s enemies tend to see their political careers come to an abrupt end, Raffensperger’s approach is watched closely by Republicans inside and outside the state.
“The last internal poll I saw said 87% of Republican primary voters felt the election was stolen,” former Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-Ga.) Said. “With numbers like that, I don’t see Brad making it through primary.”
If Raffensperger isn’t Trump’s GOP’s best enemy, he’s close. The Georgian secretary of state has refused Trump’s requests to change the state’s vote count and has argued with the former president over Trump’s baseless allegations of widespread electoral fraud. At one point, Raffensperger’s office secretly recorded Trump trying to persuade the Secretary of State to “find” votes to make him the winner – a potential Trump crime that local prosecutors are currently investigating.
As a result, Trump inundated him with criticism for nearly a year, going so far as to call Raffensperger an “enemy of the people.”
Trump’s obsession with Raffensperger shows no signs of abating. In July, the former president sent him a letter again asking him to withdraw the attestation of the 2020 election results. Just two weeks ago, at a rally in Georgia, Trump called Raffensperger a ‘”incompetent and strange”.
When Rep. Jody Hice (R-Ga.) – a staunch Trump ally – announced earlier this year that he would challenge Raffensperger in the primary, Trump immediately endorsed him.
Trump also asked Hice to make brief remarks at the September rally where the former president also ransacked Gov. Brian Kemp, Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan, and State Attorney General Chris Carr – all Republicans who pushed back on Trump’s calls to overturn the election results.
Duncan, who criticized Trump, decided not to run for another term and instead wrote a book on the future of the party. Kemp and Carr are seeking re-election next year along with Raffensperger, but have largely ignored the president’s attacks.
Raffensperger took a different approach.
After Trump used his rally to poke fun at Democrat Stacey Abrams – who is expected to run her second campaign for governor of Georgia after formally refusing to concede her last run for office three years ago – Raffensperger wrote an op-ed USA Today comparing Trump to Abrams.
Next month he will publish a book titled “Integrity Matters,” touted by Simon & Schuster as “the inspiring story of Raffensperger’s commitment to the integrity of American democracy.”
“We are there to set the record straight. Number 1 is that President Trump did not wear the state of Georgia, ”Raffensperger told POLITICO, pointing to several recounts, reviews and investigations that have confirmed the accuracy of Georgia’s results.
Seth Bringman, spokesman for Abrams, criticized Raffensperger for comparing his 2018 defeat to that of Trump, saying that “Abrams succeeded in court in counting more votes from Georgians, with reputable lawyers presenting arguments consistent, and the courts have accepted and counted those votes. It surprises us that Raffensperger equates counting eligible votes on the basis of the facts to rejecting the will of the people on the basis of the Big Lie. “
Raffensperger’s editorial, Bringman said, goes back to “attacking Stacey and pushing electoral subversion in a sad attempt to win the votes of the insurgent wing in her next primary.”
Raffensperger’s frontal assault on Trump is widely seen as a doomed strategy in a state where Trump dominates the GOP and the majority of Republicans believe the 2020 election was stolen – a January poll showed that only 45% of Republicans supported the secretary of state.
This investigation was carried out just after the Republican incumbents lost their two second-round races in the United States Senate on January 5. Both senators called on Raffensperger to resign at Trump’s insistence after losing Georgia in November.
Speaking of Raffensperger’s confrontational approach to Trump, Westmoreland said, “It’s probably not useful in a primary. Republican voters believe the election was stolen. But he also said many Republicans were troubled by Trump’s comment that Abrams “might be better than having your current governor.”
Although Raffensperger recognizes the difficulties he faces in the future, he said he has no choice but to speak out. He also didn’t blame Kemp or Carr for not denouncing Trump’s efforts to overturn the election.
“It’s a riddle on how to answer certain statements [from Trump] when they’re exaggerated, or said pejoratively, ”Raffensperger said. “If the former president backed Stacey Abrams, I think it would be shocking to most Republicans. “
Raffensperger said he was confident voters would reward him for leading a race “with integrity” and that “they understood that I will make the tough and tough calls to stand up … because it’s easy to follow your integrity. . It may not be fun. But the decision was easy, because it was based on the law, the Constitution and the truth. “
Trump is expected to return to the state before the 2022 primaries, and he’s sure to throw Raffensperger out again. Raffensperger said he was comfortable continuing to push back Trump if the situation warrants it.
“I think it’s always important to tell the truth,” he said. “I think it’s always important to do it with respect.
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