Incumbent Georgie Sen. David Perdue, one of two Republican candidates vying for the state’s two open Senate seats in a runoff election, is offering to pay out of his own pocket for New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez to come campaign for his opponent.
“I’m going to buy her a ticket! I want her to come down to Georgia,” Perdue said during a campaign rally Monday, saying he hopes the self-proclaimed democratic socialist will throw her support behind his opponent, Jon Ossoff.
Perdue later said on Fox & Friends, “I want to buy her ticket. I want her to come.”
While AOC’s message of big government, socialist policies, sky-high taxes and multi-trillion-dollar overhauls for climate change might resonate with fellow progressives on social media, it hasn’t proven to be a winning platform for Democrats coast to coast – particularly those in swing states like Georgia, or in purple districts where blue voters tend to care far more about the economy and health care than global warming. Michigan Democrat Rep. Elissa Slotkin recently criticized her own party’s leadership, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, for not pushing back on their own radicals and far-left platforms like “defund the police” and a push for socialism, saying that while that message might resonate in certain places in California and New York, it damages Democrats’ chances in more moderate areas where even Democrat voters aren’t looking to abolish the cops or surrender everything to the government.
Georgia is holding runoff elections for both U.S. Senate seats on Jan. 5, where GOP incumbents Perdue and Sen. Kelly Loeffler will face off against Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock. If the GOP holds on to both Senate seats, Republicans will maintain control of the Senate, making it more difficult for a Biden/Harris administration to move forward with the agenda they promised voters during the campaign.
(Cover Photo: Gage Skidmore)