A Year After Loeffler Was Appointed To “Win Back Suburbs,” Her False Attacks Have Made Her A Liability For Republicans

Today marks the anniversary of unelected “political mega-donor” Kelly Loeffler’s controversial appointment to the U.S. Senate by her political patron Governor Brian Kemp in an attempt “to win back suburbs” and “appeal to the more moderate, suburban voters Republicans have lost.” One year later, Loeffler’s political career has been a slow-moving trainwreck for the GOP as she’s spent the year mired in scandals. 

In a desperate attempt to distract from her toxic record and endless bad headlines, Loeffler has spent the runoff flinging false attacks at Reverend Raphael Warnock that have been repeatedly debunked and widely condemned. In the last week alone, four nonpartisan fact checks said her claims lack “context,” are “Mostly False,” and have earned her “Three Pinocchios.” Loeffler’s “highly selective” and “disturbing” lies about Reverend Warnock and the historic church where he serves as senior pastor are also being called out for crossing a line. 

A new report from Reuters finds that Loeffler is turning off Georgians and her attacks “risk suburban votes” in the runoff. One independent voter who has cast his ballot twice for Trump told Reuters he “isn’t sure he will vote on Jan. 5” because he dislikes Loeffler’s attacks, saying “this is just getting ugly for no reason,” while a former Republican legislator said Loeffler’s attacks have “a racial undertone” that “turned off voters” in suburban areas. 

“Kelly Loeffler is a scandal-plagued, self-dealing, corrupt politician whose attempts to distract from her toxic record of shady, well-timed stock trades and messy conflicts of interest have made her even more of a liability,” said DSCC spokesperson Shea Necheles. “Loeffler can’t find anything good to say about her own record so she’s resorted to false smears, but Georgians see these attacks for what they are: desperate lies.” 

Reuters: Trump loyalist Loeffler’s attacks on pastor Warnock risk suburban votes in Georgia’s U.S. Senate race

By Rich McKay and David Morgan

December 4, 2020

Key Points:

• Davis, an independent who has voted twice for President Donald Trump, isn’t sure he will vote on Jan. 5. He dislikes Trump loyalist Loeffler’s campaign attacks on her Democratic opponent, the Reverend Raphael Warnock, a Black pastor at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, where slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. once preached.
  
• “This is just getting ugly for no reason,” Davis said while Christmas shopping in the suburban city of Marietta, 20 miles (32 km) northwest of Atlanta.

• A Warnock campaign spokesman described the attacks as an attempt to distract voter attention from Loeffler’s record on healthcare and other issues.

• Other white suburban voters may share Davis’ concerns about Loeffler. “The imagery used certainly had a racial undertone, and I think that turned off voters in those suburban areas,” said Matt Towery, a former Georgia Republican legislator.

• Loeffler, a wealthy businesswoman, has had to rely on advertising more heavily than Perdue to assure voters about her conservative credentials. As a result, political analysts say, she has more strongly paralleled Trump’s combative messaging style and agenda priorities, at one point describing herself as more conservative than Attila the Hun.

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