With less than a month until primary day, here’s the latest on Georgia’s “slugfest” GOP primary:
NEW POTENTIAL TIES REVEALED BETWEEN GEORGIANS FOR INTEGRITY AND RICK JACKSON: New reporting from the AJC Monday revealed that the same attorney who signed documents incorporating the anti-Burt Jones group Georgians for Integrity also filed documents creating Alabama Patients First, a group that funded negative ads against Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Alabama during a legal fight involving a hospital operated by Jackson’s billion-dollar health care firm.
- This comes as Georgians for Integrity faces state ethics charges related to violating Georgia lobbying and campaign finance laws.
- It’s the clearest sign yet of potential ties between Jackson and the mysterious Georgians for Integrity, which has spent at least $19.5 million attacking Burt Jones’ record of self-enrichment in public office.
JONES, JACKSON RAMP UP THEIR NASTY ONLINE FEUD: If there’s anything you can count on these days, it’s that Jones and Jackson will never pass up an opportunity to attack each other online – and sure enough, they continued beefing on social media this week.
- Jones launched yet another ad calling Jackson “Slick Rick” and labeling him “Not a Trump conservative (but plays one on TV).”
- Jackson followed up with a video labeling Jones a “corrupt career politician” who is “crooked as a dog’s hind leg.”
- The GOP candidates have now spent nearly $100 million on commercials, digital ads, and mailers to destroy each other ahead of the primary.
GOP FIELD RACES RIGHT AND PLEDGES LOYALTY TO TRUMP, NOT GEORGIANS: The entire Republican field continued embracing extreme positions that show they’re more interested in paying attention to Donald Trump than the needs of Georgia families.
- At the Georgia Association of Manufacturers’ Gubernatorial Candidate Forum on Tuesday, the GOP candidates reiterated their support for Donald Trump’s’ cost-raising and job-killing policies like tariffs and the One Big Beautiful Bill that have made life much more expensive for Georgia families.
- New data released from the Joint Economic Committee this week shows that Georgians are spending $1,762 more annually just to keep up with these very same cost-raising policies – including $410 more on housing and $355 more on transportation.
- A new ad from Jones this week underscores just how closely he has aligned himself with Trump – saying that he was the “first Georgia official to endorse [Trump]” – even as the president is massively unpopular, with a new 37 percent approval rating across the state.
MUST READ: The AJC Wednesday reported on Democratic optimism in the gubernatorial race, writing that “In an internal strategy memo sent out this morning, party chair Charlie Bailey brands the GOP primary a self-inflicted bloodbath and unveils a new “Peach State Gubernatorial War Room” to target Republicans through November.” Read more from the AJC, and check out our new memo highlighting how Republican chaos and infighting will leave the eventual GOP nominee badly bruised leading into the general election campaign.
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