Few surprises in this week’s primaries

Republicans are all MAGA now

Yesterday was a primary day in Georgia, and the results held few surprises for those who had been paying attention. Perhaps the biggest surprise was that Democrat primary ballots outnumbered Republicans both in the early voting and on Election Day. Democrats had an edge of about 150,000 votes, which is very unusual for Georgia.

The actual results were pretty much as expected. Georgia requires a majority so there will be a runoff if no candidate gets more than 50 percent of the vote. The top two Republican candidates for governor were both MAGA: Rick Jackson, the billionaire who has spent $80 million of his own money to win a job with a $185,000 salary, and Burt Jones, the current lieutenant governor and an unindicted coconspirator in the 2020 fake elector plot. Former Atlanta mayor Keshia Lance Bottoms won the Democratic nomination outright.

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MAGA had a good night, and if you know the Georgia GOP, this was no surprise. In one of the more notable results, Vernon Jones, a former Democrat who is black, earned a spot in the runoff with Tim Fleming. Jones has a history of scandal that includes both firing white employees and replacing them with blacks and a history of sexual misconduct that includes a rape allegation. But he’s a black Trump supporter. Fleming, his opponent, is also an election denier. I wouldn’t trust either with the integrity and security of Georgia elections.

A bright spot for Democrats was the fact that Senator Jon Ossoff’s opponent will either be Rep. Mike Collins, a MAGA radical, or Derek Dooley, the son of a legendary UGA coach but a political neophyte. The runoff will test the influence of Gov. Brian Kemp, who handpicked Dooley, over the MAGA preference for Collins. Ossoff will likely beat either option.

One of the most curious, albeit not surprising elements of the evening, was the result of two state Supreme Court races. These nonpartisan races appeared on the primary ballots, and Democrats had placed high hopes on their preferred candidates, who ran afoul of ethics rules regarding statements addressing issues that they might rule on as justices. This scandal broke just before Election Day. (Accusations that Kemp moved the judicial elections to the primary to confuse voters are false. Judicial elections have been held in the spring for at least 10 years.)

Both incumbents won re-election, but the curious thing was that challenger Miracle Rankin ran eight points ahead of her co-Democrat Jen Jordan in the parallel race. There is speculation that this may have been due to the fact that Rankin’s name sounded “black” or that Democrat voters didn’t familiarize themselves with the ballot, but it may just be that Jen Jordan, a former state senator and candidate for attorney general, wasn’t very popular. The loss in the two races even as Democratic voters were more energized and engaged may be due to a hesitance to politicize the state judiciary.

Outside of Georgia, Thomas Massie’s congressional race in Kentucky was closely watched. Massie, a libertarian Trump critic, was targeted by Trump for defeat. Massie lost by about 10 points.

In addition to being a Trump critic, Massie was a bit of a nut. His defeat may be partially explained by his response, in which he attacked his opponent’s support of Israel by claiming that he was in Tel Aviv during the election.

And finally, Texas has not yet held its primary, but Donald Trump endorsed another Vernon Jones-type candidate there. Ken Paxton is a serial adulterer who was impeached by Texas Republicans for corruption. It’s no surprise that Trump likes him, but his strong support from the Christian right is disappointing.

The big takeaway from Tuesday is that the Republican Party is firmly under Trump’s control. Dissenting politicians are being purged, even if it means that it is more likely that Democrats win control of the House and Senate.

This is more confirmation that the old conservative Republican Party no longer exists. There is only Donald Trump’s personality cult and the Democrats. A vote for any Republican is a vote to enable Donald Trump’s authoritarian agenda.

That’s the choice for November.

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