In
Georgia, a Democrat's 'Make Trump Furious' campaign rattles Republicans
By
John Whitesides
Yahoo
Here, Democrats are threatening a stunning special election upset
that could signal how well the party can turn Trump's low approval ratings into
political gains. And they appear to have an ally in the April 18 vote: Trump
himself.
In the first congressional election of the Trump era, a wave of
grassroots anti-Trump fervor has positioned Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old
political newcomer, to possibly capture a House of Representatives seat held by
Republicans for decades, one of 24 seats Democrats need nationwide to reclaim
the House.
"The grassroots intensity here is electric, and it’s because
folks are concerned that what is happening in Washington doesn’t represent our
values," Ossoff said in an interview. "This is a chance for this
community to stand up and make a statement about what we believe."
With Democrats desperate for signs of hope after Hillary Clinton's
loss to Trump, Ossoff's underdog "Make Trump Furious" campaign has
endeared him to national anti-Trump activists and pushed him well ahead of 17
rivals in polls. The documentary filmmaker and former congressional aide raised
a jaw-dropping $8.3 million in the first quarter, his campaign said.
"I've never seen the Democrats around here so engaged, and
it's Donald Trump who got us so engaged," said Carolyn Hadaway, 77, a
veteran party activist and retired software engineer from Marietta, a city of
about 60,000 people in Georgia’s central Cobb County.
Georgia would seem an unlikely venue for a Democratic revival.
Trump won it by about 5 percentage points in November. And its voters backed
Republican nominees in eight of the last nine presidential contests, including
the last six in a row.
But demographic changes are brewing. Growing minority communities
and transplants from other regions have made Atlanta's suburbs increasingly
competitive for Democrats. Georgia’s sixth congressional district, the location
for April’s special election, exemplifies changes common in booming southern
cities like Atlanta, Charlotte and Nashville.
The district is white collar, educated and doing well economically,
with median household incomes of $80,000 versus $50,000 statewide, and nearly
60 percent of adults holding a college or professional degree, more than twice
the statewide average. It is also increasingly diverse, and in recent years
became a magnet for well-educated immigrants from India and other parts of
Asia.
The district was about 80 percent white at the turn of the century.
But since then, the black share of the population has grown from 10 percent to
13 percent, the Hispanic share has doubled to 12.5 percent and Asian
representation doubled to more than 10 percent.
About a fifth of the district is now foreign born – twice the
statewide average, according to census data.
Though newer immigrants may not be eligible to vote, census data
indicate more than 40 percent are naturalized citizens, potentially bringing a
different set of views on issues like immigration to the table than the voters
in this district who sent Trump adviser and former speaker of the House Newt
Gingrich to Congress for 10 straight terms.
April’s special election fills the seat vacated by Tom Price, the
new secretary of health and human services. It gives both parties a chance to
test their messages for election battles next year in suburban districts where
Democrats need to make inroads and where Trump's populist economic message did
not sell well in November.
While Price sailed to re-election with 62 percent of the vote,
Trump barely beat Clinton in Georgia's sixth district by one percentage point.
In 2012, Republican Mitt Romney beat Democratic President Barack Obama in the
district by 23 points.
‘JUMP OVER A CLIFF’
Republican candidates nationwide will closely watch the result as
they calculate whether to embrace the president.
The 11 Republicans in the race have split between those who portray
themselves as Trump supporters and establishment candidates who keep a
respectful and sometimes wary distance.
"I'm ready to support him," former state senator Dan
Moody, who was endorsed by U.S. Senator David Perdue, said of Trump in an
interview. But "I'm not going to jump over a cliff with him."
Grassroots Democratic groups flood the district's tidy suburban
neighborhoods on the weekends, busing in volunteers from as far away as
Maryland to go door to door on Ossoff's behalf.
The Ossoff momentum worries Republicans, say party officials, and
outside help has arrived. A super PAC aligned with House Republican leaders put
more than $2 million into ads painting Ossoff as too young and inexperienced.
Ossoff played down the strategic value of a possible upset.
"The national implications here will be about how this affects
the political calculus for folks in the Republican conference in the House, not
about how Democrats are supposed to run in the midterms," he said.
‘CONCERN, NOT PANIC’
In a low turnout special election, getting supporters to the polls
is vital, and Democrats have voted early in greater numbers than Republicans so
far.
"We aren't panicking, but there is concern," said Maggie
Holliman, a member of the Republican state executive committee.
Ossoff's best chance is to win the April 18 vote, a "jungle
primary" that features all 18 candidates from both parties on the same
ballot. If no one reaches 50 percent, the top two vote getters square off on
June 20.
Republicans are confident they can win a one-on-one race with
Ossoff, as the party unites with organizational and financial help pouring into
the Republican-majority district.
"There is a chance Ossoff can win without a runoff, but that's
his only chance. He's benefiting from unified Democratic support and
Republicans being highly divided," said Georgia-based Republican
strategist Joel McElhannon.
Polls show Ossoff hovering in the low 40s, not enough to avoid a
runoff. The leading Republican, former Secretary of State Karen Handel, is well
behind.
Handel has been cautious in talking about Trump. She said in an
interview she expected to work with him on issues such as tax reform and border
security, but "first and foremost" she would be a conservative
advocate for her district.
By contrast Republicans Bob Gray, a local business executive, and
Bruce LeVell, head of Trump's national diversity coalition, pledge undivided
loyalty to the White House. Gray said he was the Republican in the race who
performed the behind-the-scenes political groundwork for Trump in the district.
LeVell pulled out his cellphone and showed a reporter text messages
from Trump aides Kellyanne Conway, Sarah Huckabee Sanders and even Trump
son-in-law Jared Kushner to prove his insider status with the White House.
"If people are looking for someone to help Trump, I'm their
guy," he said.
(Additional reporting by Howard Schneider in Washington; Editing by
Jason Szep and Mary Milliken)
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