Georgia Republicans spent $13.5 million to turn out Donald Trump voters

The party linked President-elect Donald Trump’s victory in Georgia to a high-risk, high-reward effort to reach conservatives who don’t regularly cast ballots, an aggressive media strategy and a new emphasis on early voting.

Credit: Hyosub Shin/AJC

Credit: Hyosub Shin/AJC

The 14-page report touted pro-Trump efforts to change State Election Board rules opposed by voting rights groups and Democrats. It also noted an “outside the box voter contact strategy” by 85 full-time staffers who trained 15,000 volunteers.

All told, the party said it spent roughly $13.5 million with the Trump campaign to encourage low-propensity voters “who would definitely vote Republican IF they voted” to cast their ballots early.

“We knew there was no way our high propensity voters would miss voting in this election,” read the report. “Therefore, the key to victory was in the hands of new voters and low propensity voters” during the three-week early voting period.

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GOOD MORNING! An early Happy Thanksgiving from the Politically Georgia crew. Please know we are grateful for your support. This is our last newsletter of the week. We hope to see you again on Monday. In the meantime, be sure to check AJC.com for all the political news from Georgia and beyond.

Here are three things to know for today:

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Credit: Curtis Compton/AJC

Credit: Curtis Compton/AJC

RECALIBRATE. For state attorneys general, it’s sometimes easier politically when you have a foil in the White House. Republican presidents get sued by Democrats, and vice versa.

A change in administration brings a change in tactics. But there are still plenty of options for ambitious AGs to stay involved on the national stage, said former Georgia Attorney General Sam Olens.

For one thing, AGs can file briefs to defend the president when the other side inevitably sues. And during former President Donald Trump’s first term, Democratic attorneys general would often ask judges for rulings that applied to the entire country, an act that would require a response from Republican attorneys general.

Still, it requires a balancing act.

“There’s areas naturally where you really disagree with the actions of the administration and you need to defend your state,” Olens said. “And then there’s areas where it just looks political.”

Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr has experience in both scenarios. During Trump’s first term, he filed briefs to defend the administration’s policies, including an executive order to reduce regulations.

More recently, he has sued President Joe Biden’s administration over a host of issues, including emission standards and forgiving student loans.

It could be tricky for Carr to navigate a second Trump presidency. Trump endorsed his opponent in a 2022 Republican primary. But Carr won easily on his way to a second term. He’s now running for governor in 2026.

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Credit: Courtesy photos

Credit: Courtesy photos

WRITE-IN RESULTS. Democrats in Georgia’s 11th Congressional District scrambled to support a write-in candidate, Tracey Verhoeven, after realizing the woman who won the party’s primary, Katy Stamper, has far-right political leanings.

The results, however, were predictable. U.S. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, R-Cassville, was reelected with about 67% of the votes. Stamper received about 32%. And Verhoeven was a distant third with 3% of the vote.

Still, Verhoeven says she is grateful that thousands of people wrote in her name. “It was just a humbling, loving, wonderful experience,” she said of her abbreviated six-week campaign.

Now, party activists and leaders are left wondering what they can do in the future if similar situations happen again. Communication is one lesson learned, since Georgia law doesn’t allow party leaders to prevent someone like Stamper running as a Democrat again.

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Credit: File photos

Credit: File photos

THE MARGIN. Election results aren’t like baseball statistics. Most people can tell you who won, but they don’t know by how much.

That changed in 2020, when Georgia’s election margin became a meme because of a now famous phone call from then-President Donald Trump to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. In the call, Trump asked for Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, to “find 11,780 votes,” which was one more than he needed to win.

That number became famous, landing on T-shirts, hats and stickers.

The 2024 margin is 115,100, this time in favor of Trump. It’s unlikely to be remembered. State officials certified the results last week to little fanfare. Trump had no complaints.

Here’s how Georgia compared to its fellow swing states, listed by margin of victory from largest to smallest (Trump won all of them):

Note: Not all of these vote totals are official yet.

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Credit: Courtesy photo

Credit: Courtesy photo

ROAD LESS TRAVELED. In business and politics, state Rep.-elect Anissa Jones has always known where she’s going. She’s just taken a different route to get there.

She was all set to go to medical school to become an OB-GYN. But she changed her mind and instead went on to become a chiropractor, inspired by her grandmother’s homemade salves to tend to her childhood wounds.

“It really sparked something within me, just a different alternative to health care,” she said.

In politics, the conventional path would be to start either on the county commission or city council. Instead, Jones set her sights on the Macon Water Authority, defeating a longtime incumbent.

“I was very strategic on where I wanted to start,” she said. “You cannot start a business, you cannot bring a development to the area, without water. They’re going to call you first.”

Jones, a Democrat, is one of 22 new state lawmakers who will take office in January. She replaces state Rep. James Beverly, the House minority leader who opted not to run for reelection.

Like most new lawmakers, Jones said she plans to “listen, learn and collaborate” during her first term. But she hopes to continue her work on economic development.

One idea is to sponsor a bill to encourage the use of recyclable materials in residential home construction, with a goal of reducing waste and making homes more affordable.

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CRYPTO ELECTION. Screven County made history this year by becoming the first in the U.S. to use Bitcoin as additional security for election results.

Bitcoin is a digital currency that only exists online. That’s possible because of the currency’s blockchain, a digital ledger that records transactions through a peer-to-peer network. Screven County Election Supervisor Stacy Scott Mincey used the Bitcoin blockchain to secure the county’s election results this year, as first reported by Forbes.

Partnering with the company Simple Proof, each public record is cryptographically time-stamped at the time it is placed on the blockchain and given a unique code that anyone can verify.

“It would be so easy for someone to take the results and manipulate it to make it look like we got different results than we did, and this was just one more way we could prove what our initial results were,” Mincey told The AJC’s Caleb Groves.

This isn’t the first election Simple Proof was involved in. The company also secured records in the most recent Guatemalan presidential election.

“One hundred years from now, when you’re looking at the historical records of the Georgia archives, people in the future can study the records knowing, for themselves, that they’re looking at primary source data,” said Carlos Toriello, lead of elections at Simple Proof.

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Credit: Katelyn Myrick/AJC

Credit: Katelyn Myrick/AJC

LISTEN UP. Today on “Politically Georgia,” the hosts answer questions from our listener mailbag. Then, you’ll hear producer Natalie Mendenhall’s interview with Emory University professor Drew Westen about how to keep things civil with family and friends while discussing politics this holiday season.

Note: There will be no podcast on Thursday and Friday. It returns on Monday.

Be sure to download the AJC’s Politically Georgia podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Episodes are uploaded by noon each day, just in time to have lunch with us. You can also listen live at 10 a.m. EDT on 90.1 FM WABE. Have a question for the show? Give us a call at 770-810-5297.

On Tuesday’s show, the AJC’s Shannon McCaffrey talked about the Fulton County election interference case against President-elect Donald Trump and his allies. Then, AJC Publisher Andrew Morse discussed how journalists will cover the Trump presidency. Finally, Ligaya Figueras, the AJC’s senior editor for food and dining, spoke about what she plans to serve for Thanksgiving dinner.

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Credit: Courtesy photo

Credit: Courtesy photo

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AS ALWAYS, send your best scoops, gossip and insider info to greg.bluestein@ajc.com, tia.mitchell@ajc.com, patricia.murphy@ajc.com and adam.beam@ajc.com.