But with Trump out of office and off Twitter, his messaging significantly diminished, it’s an open question how interested Republicans still are in using their votes to relitigate the 2020 election. “I wish Trump would stay out of the election—let them run the race by themselves,” said one Kemp supporter at the Richmond Hill event. His friend, who said he hadn’t decided which candidate to support, agreed: “In fact, I told Perdue last week when he was here in Savannah, he needs to put all his ads with Trump in the closet for a while and let’s just hear what he has to say.” (Both declined to give even their first names; they’re plenty friendly in southeast Georgia, but you don’t get the sense they like reporters much.)
A recent poll of Georgia GOP primary voters commissioned by the nonprofit Secure Democracy USA and conducted by GOP pollster American Viewpoint found that, while 88 percent of voters view Trump favorably, only 13 percent cited voting and elections as their top issue in deciding their primary vote.
It may not be that Republican voters care less than they used to about elections; it’s also that the election bill Kemp signed last year overhauled many elements of the state’s election laws, including requiring all precincts to have at least 17 days of early voting, shrinking the window for requesting an absentee ballot, and implementing voter ID for absentee ballot applications.
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