Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections for July 23, 2018

On July 23, 1864, Union and Confederate forces in and around Atlanta gathered the dead and worked to save the wounded. Union artillery began bombarding Atlanta. On July 23, 2014, Republicans did the same in the aftermath of the Primary Runoff Elections the previous day. Democratic artillery advertising would soon fill the air.

Former President Ulysses S. Grant died on July 23, 1885.

The Cleveland Metropolitan Park District was established on July 23, 1917 and currently has a set of beautiful parks winding through the city. If you’re going to be in Cleveland for the 2016 Republican National Convention, take some time to tour the city, including the parks.

John Smoltz started his first game as a major league pitcher on July 23, 1988, as the Braves took a win over the New York Mets.

Georgia Politics, Campaigns, and Elections

Vice President Mike Pence headlined a rally for Brian Kemp’s gubernatorial campaign in Macon on Saturday, according to the Macon Telegraph.

President Donald Trump endorsed Kemp about four days before the rally.

Pence flew into the Macon Regional Airport and a motorcade took him to the Wilson Convention Center, where hundreds of Kemp signs were staked out in the median of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. Secret Service agents, Bibb County sheriff’s deputies and Monroe County sheriff’s deputies helped with security.

About a thousand people filed through a metal detector and gathered in the auditorium waiting for Kemp and Pence.

At times, the crowd would chant “build that wall,” “Kemp” or “USA.”

From the New York Times:

On Saturday, Mr. Pence riled up Mr. Kemp’s fervent supporters and posed for selfies afterward while country music blared from the speakers.

“Brian Kemp will bring the kind of leadership to the Statehouse that President Donald Trump has brought to the White House,” Mr. Pence told the crowd of at least 1,000 people inside the Edgar H. Wilson Convention Center.

Some political observers wonder whether Mr. Kemp will adopt a more centrist tone — in an attempt to win moderate voters — should he defeat Mr. Cagle. But Charles Bullock III, a professor of political science at the University of Georgia, said Georgia’s demographics make it possible for Mr. Kemp to win the general election without softening his campaign’s strong rhetoric, which Democrats have criticized as divisive.

Georgia Republicans will come together in a Unity Rally on Thursday, according to the AJC.

As some Republican officials call for cooler talk in the poisonous runoff for governor, the Georgia GOP has scheduled a unity rally after voters decide next week’s contest between Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle and Secretary of State Brian Kemp.

The Thursday evening event will feature the two bitter rivals along with Gov. Nathan Deal, U.S. Sen. David Perdue, House Speaker David Ralston and other Republican elders – each presumably saying the party will unite to defeat Democrat Stacey Abrams in November.

“The stakes in Georgia have never been higher. While our candidates continue to seek the Republican nomination, Stacey Abrams is on the war path to make our state as liberal as California and New York. We can’t let that happen,” read the note.

“No matter who our Republican nominee is for governor, we must rally together as a united force.”

Early voting numbers via the Secretary of State’s absentee voting files.

2018 Early and Advance Voting in the Primary and Primary Runoff Elections

	May Primary			July Primary
Republican	173615	53.2%		164467	77.9%
Democrat	152576	46.8%		46692	22.1%
TOTAL	326191			211159
Gwinnett Early/Advance Voting
	May Primary			July Primary
Republican	6430	42.2%		5117	59.4%
Democrat	8821	57.8%		3500	40.6%
TOTAL	15251			8617

The Valdosta Daily Times looks at early voting in Lowndes County.

Lowndes County elections office reported 2,023 people cast ballots by the conclusion of early voting Friday, July 20, according to election officials.

Polls will be open 7 a.m.-7 p.m., July 24, for runoff election day voting.

Deb Cox, Lowndes County election supervisor, said recently runoff voting is open to all registered voters. A voter did not have to vote in the May primary to vote in the runoff.

“If they voted in the primary, they will vote the same party in the runoff,” Cox said recently. “If they voted non-partisan or didn’t vote in the primary, they can choose either party in the runoff.”

The Dalton Daily Citizen talked to voters and election officials about early voting.

Early voting allows residents to vote before Election Day at the local voting office. In Georgia, early voting takes place three weeks before Election Day in all elections. The three-week voting period was decided by the state, said Deb Cox, Lowndes County supervisor of elections. In the past, shorter and longer early voting periods were tested, but the state decided three weeks is the best number for the majority of counties.

“It’s a little inconvenient for the small ones, and it’s not quite enough for the large ones, but for the majority, it’s just about right,” Cox said.

For residents, early voting helps decrease the number of errors in the voting process when issues arise. Cox said those errors can undermine the democratic process.

“If people aren’t registered to vote correctly, if they don’t get the right ballot, if they don’t have access to voting, then nothing else is going to work,” she said. “The people you elect are not going to be the right people. The questions that are answered are not the right questions. The opinions given to your elected officials aren’t going to be right. So, if this isn’t right down here, then nothing is right.”

Glynn County saw heavier early voting than votes cast in the primary, according to The Brunswick News.

Elections and registration supervisor Monica Couch said 3,441 people had voted as of 5 p.m. Friday. Based on numbers from the first week of early runoff voting, Couch said earlier this month that voters were on track to surpass the number of votes cast in the May primaries.

She wasn’t wrong, runoff votes surpassed those in the primary by more than 1,000. Couch has previously said the turnout was particularly high given that the polls were closed for the Fourth of July and the board did not open the polls on Saturday.

Nearly twice as many people voted at the St. Simons Island polling location, 2,254 than at the mainland, which saw 1,187 voters.

The number of mail-in ballots was much higher as well. As of Thursday, 193 people voted by mail in the runoff, compared to 88 in the primaries.

The board will accept mail-in ballots until the polls close on runoff election day Tuesday.

Gwinnett County expects lighter voting in the primary runoff than in the May primary elections, according to the Gwinnett Daily Post.

Gwinnet Elections and Registration Director Lynn Ledford said the three-week early voting period was mostly quiet. There was a period Friday when the turnout picked up and there was a line of voters for about an hour and a half on the last day of early voting. That was the exception rather than the rule for turnout for this election, though, Ledford said.

About 1.4 percent of the county’s total electorate cast runoff ballots during early voting, based on figures provided by Gwinnett officials. County spokesman Joe Sorenson said 7,354 early ballots had been cast in Gwinnett by Friday night. There are 508,877 people registered to vote.

By comparison, 13,856 ballots were cast during early voting for the May 22 primary, about 2.7 percent of the 500,308 people registered to vote in that election.

“We were optimistic about a 10 to 15 percent total turnout,” Ledford said. “I don’t know that we’re going to see that now based on if you just look at that early voting number.

Brian Kemp campaigned for Governor in Newnan over the weekend, according to the Newnan Times-Herald.

Over 100 people came out Sunday to a campaign stop by Brian Kemp, Republican candidate for governor.

Kemp’s tour bus was accompanied by a Trump 2020 painted bus at the campaign stop, held in the Sprayberry’s parking lot on Jackson Street. Kemp received President Trump’s endorsement in a tweet late last week.

“There’s no second place in politics. You serve or you lose,” Kemp said as he milled through the crowd, shaking hands and posing for pictures. “We got in it to win it.”

Kemp was introduced by Carroll County Commission Chairman Marty Smith and Newnan Mayor Keith Brady. “It’s my pleasure today to welcome Brian and his family to the city of Newnan,” Brady said. “It’s an understatement to say this has been a long, hard campaign. Through the whole campaign Brian has been consistent in his message and the citizens of Georgia have heard this message and they agree that we need secure borders, we need the interests of the hardworking men and women of this state to be held above all other interests,” Brady said.

 The Gwinnett Daily Post’s Curt Yeomans looks at the qualitative side of the Primary runoff elections.

While a lot of the things said in the campaign have been hurled by the campaigns themselves, University of Georgia political science professor Charles Bullock said the influence of outside groups can’t be discounted either.

“Runoffs are usually hard-hitting, this one probably a bit more so,” Bullock said. “Or at least it may seem that way because of the vast amounts of money that have been spent, not just by the campaigns, but also by these entities which are not affiliated with the campaigns but nonetheless have been running some very hard-hitting ads.”

Bullock said most polls he has seen indicate it will likely go down to the wire, and possibly still go either way, Tuesday.

“I think it’s still fairly close,” he said. “Right now, I’d have to say Kemp is ahead, but there’s probably going to be a low and one of the other things you’ll want to factor in would be what other items are going to be on the ballot.”

“What a candidate has to do to survive is to try and unite the party behind him and the harder hitting the (primary and runoff) campaign is, the more difficult it may be,” Bullock said. “While the eliminated candidate grudgingly says, ‘Yeah, I’ll support my party’s nominee,’ there may be some followers of that eliminated candidate who can’t get over what was said.

The Associated Press writes that Georgia could become a swing state for 2020.

Yet in the last decade, GOP standard-bearers have typically garnered no more than 53 percent of the vote. Some Republicans say that margin isn’t enough as African-Americans, Latinos, Asian-Americans and white transplants become a larger share of the electorate. The themes that will likely dominate the general election campaign for governor, including immigration and race, will help determine whether Democrats can become consistently competitive in the Deep South after years of stinging defeats.

A close loss for Democrats will still be a loss. “There are no more moral victories in Georgia,” says Democratic consultant Tharon Johnson. It’s time for Democrats to capitalize on demographic changes and a “talented candidate” who should have plenty of campaign cash thanks to her national celebrity, he says.

“These changes in states like Georgia aren’t occurring in a vacuum,” says Democratic pollster Zac McCrary. “The party cannot afford to get in a situation where their only path to 270 (electoral votes) has to include Ohio, so we need to bring a state like Georgia online as a possibility.”

The question is whether Republicans can continue to rely on a large share of the white vote outside Georgia’s cities to ensure victory.

Steve Foster, Democratic candidate for the 14th District Congressional seat held by Republican Tom Graves, was arrested and charged with DUI, according to Newsweek.

Police were called on an African-American canvasser in Gwinnett County, according to WSB.

Morehouse College junior Eli Sabur has been canvassing since 2015. He’s spent countless hours knocking on doors, trying to get metro Atlanta residents to support causes — from political candidates to public broadcasting — that he cares about.

Approximately three times a month, someone calls the police, Sabur said.

That happened on June 30 in Snellville. Sabur and a friend were canvassing for Democratic congressional candidate David Kim, who is in the July 24 runoff election for the 7th Congressional District, when three Gwinnett County police cars pulled up. Someone in the neighborhood had called 911 and reported a suspicious vehicle, said Cpl. Wilbert Rundles, a Gwinnett County police spokesman.

Once officers learned Sabur and his friend were legally canvassing, they left without issuing any citation or warning.

Bulloch County Sheriff Sheriff Noel Brown told county commissioners that staff shortages are to blame for overtime paid to deputies, according to the Statesboro Herald.

Congressman Buddy Carter (R-Pooler) has more an advantage of more than $900k in campaign funding over his November opponent, according to The Brunswick News.

Republican Matt Reeves announced more than $160,000 cash-on-hand in his campaign to succeed Senator David Shafer (R-48), who is running for Lieutenant Governor, according to the Gwinnett Daily Post.

Chatham County Police Chief Jeff Hadley updated county commissioners on crime in unincorporated parts of the county, according to the Savannah Morning News.

“As a reminder, around 96 percent of thefts from autos are from unlocked vehicles,” the chief said. “We rarely have a broken window or someone punched in a lock. … That is a completely preventable experience for us in the unincorporated areas.”

Meanwhile, the chief said his department has made headway in bringing on new officers. Now at 117 employees — 87 of which are sworn personnel — Hadley said it’s possible the Chatham County Police Department could be fully staffed in early 2019. Until then, he said, the police department continues to rely on assistance from some 10 deputies from the Chatham County Sheriff’s Department.

“I think we’re progressing quite nicely,” Hadley said. “I’m very confident in the processes that we’ve undertaken to employ folks in the Chatham County Police Department.”

The US Army Corps of Engineers received additional funding for hurricane-related damage on the Georgia Coast, according to the Savannah Morning News.

Tybee Island will receive $13 million for a completely federally-funded beach renourishment to restore storm protection, including dunes for the first time.

“Basically, after Matthew and Irma it was determined that we’d lost enough sand that it would justify another renourishment,” said Tybee Mayor Jason Buelterman. “Additionally, they recognized the importance of dunes.”

Tybee expects to see the renourishment happen in the fall of 2019, more than a year ahead of the original renourishment schedule. There may also be state money available. The governor’s mid-year budget also made $10 million available for storm recovery on beaches, Buelterman said. Only Tybee and St. Simons, where Buelterman said there hasn’t been public support for renourishment, would be vying for the money.

The Savannah harbor will benefit from $26.6 million earmarked to repair a variety of storm-related damages. The federal funding will be used for dredging to remove shoaling plus repairs to three storm-damaged structures: the corps’ depot facility on Hutchinson Island, dikes in the riverside areas where dredge spoils are placed and a water control structure in the Savannah National Wildlife Refuge.

Savannah City Manager Rob Hernandez is on a shortlist for a new job in Florida, according to the Savannah Morning News.

Savannah Police opened a new Northwest Precinct, according to the Savannah Morning News.

Chatham County District Attorney Meg Heap named a new project manager for End Gun Violence, according to the Savannah Morning News.

Muscogee County District 2 voters will choose in a nonpartisan runoff election between retired Muscogee County School District teacher Mike Edmondson and small business owner Bart Steed, according to the Ledger-Enquirer.

Forsyth County Commissioners voted to put the “Brunch Bill” on the November ballot, according to AccessWDUN.

County Attorney Ken Jarrard presented the motion to the commissioners and said, “This is applicable to jurisdictions that already have Sunday alcohol sales by the drink. Pursuant to state law, the earliest you can do that is 12:30 in the afternoon on a Sunday. The so-called brunch bill would move that back to 11 a.m.”

All the commissioners voted to approve the resolution with the exception of District 1’s Pete Amos, who was absent from the meeting.

Villa Rica voters will decide three referenda in November, according to the Times-Georgian.

The first will be a referendum on behalf of Carroll County, asking that residents on that side of the city approve a one-cent sales tax for transportation projects.

Revenues from the Transportation Special Option Sales Tax would be allocated to the county’s municipalities according to their population. Villa Rica expects to receive some $6 million over the five-year term of the tax, which will be levied on all sales in the county.

Another referendum affects all residents, regardless of their county, and would allow Villa Rica to use its redevelopment powers to create “Tax Allocation Districts” (TADs) in the city.

The third referendum before Villa Rica’s voters would allow restaurants to begin serving alcohol at 11 a.m. on Sundays instead of current law, which prohibits the serving of alcohol on Sunday until 12:30 p.m.

The Douglas County Board of Commissioners has already placed a similar referendum on that county’s November ballot.

Henry County’s SPLOST V Committee holds its first meeting today, according to the Henry Herald.