Former U.S. Senator David Perdue announced he will challenge Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp for governor on Monday, setting up a bitter 2022 Republican primary fight while Democrat Stacey Abrams is likely to await the winner. Democratic President Joe Biden narrowly won Georgia in the 2020 presidential contest and Trump ally Perdue, in a video announcing his campaign, said Georgia must stop its shift leftward and avoid becoming “more like California or New York.”
“I’m running for governor to make sure Stacey Abrams is never the governor of Georgia,” he said.
Kemp refused to block the state’s presidential election results that added to Biden’s victory. Former President Donald Trump last week said his supporters would not vote for Kemp “after what he did” with the election.
Multiple recounts and investigations upheld the state’s election results.
Perdue had been flirting with the gubernatorial bid for months, encouraged publicly by Trump. The 71-year-old former senator said he was running to stop Abrams from becoming governor and claimed Kemp would lose to her in November because some hardcore Trump Republicans oppose Kemp.
“To fight back, we simply have to be united,” Perdue said. “Look, I like Brian. This isn’t personal. It’s simple: He has failed all of us and cannot win in November.”
Perdue’s entry could drag Kemp to the right as he vies for primary support. Kemp had hoped to use Abrams’ Wednesday entry to the governor’s race to rally Republicans to his side, but some Republicans fear a bitter Perdue-Kemp primary will enable Abrams to win. State Sen. Chuck Hufstetler of Rome tweeted Perdue’s entry is “Good news for Stacey Abrams. Bad news for Republicans.”
Abrams, whose narrow loss to Kemp in 2018 helped propel her to national fame as a voting rights activist and party leader, has no declared opponents on the Democratic side.
Getty Images
Getty Images
AP Images
Getty Images