Hey, it's Adam Wild and Jack's, hosts of the Adam Wild and Jack show. What does it feel like to have a better laptop like the Dell XBS powered by Intel Core? With a premium design that's thin and light, it feels smooth, very smooth. For a better feel in your hands and less weight on your shoulders. With a responsive touch screen, it feels fast and precise.
For a better scrolling, zooming and swiping. So everything just flows. And with a long lasting battery life, it feels like nonstop energy. For a better way to work without being near a charger, charger, charger. Build for those who want better, the Dell XBS built for you.
Now more than ever, quality matters, but so does price and marshals. You don't have to choose. You can get the good stuff for less. The stuff that lasts, because there's no point in typing your belt if it's just going to break when you do. Get the good stuff in store at Marshals today.
Hey, it's Mary. Can I tell you something cool that happened earlier this week in this feed? Our interview with Senate candidate Angie Nixon dropped in here early. But it only did that for Slate Plus members. That's right.
If you remember, you would have gotten a sneak preview of our Tuesday show. Plus, you would have been able to listen in as Lizzie and I had an off the record chat about the news, where you would have learned why I secretly want to start a radical La Leche League. I tell you all the time about the cool stuff. Being a Slate Plus member will get you the ad free listening, the access to Slate.com. But honestly, there are so many reasons, each and every week.
And it's pledge drive season around here. So if you haven't had the chance yet, now is your shot to get in on all the cool stuff you've been missing out on. Go on over to Slate.com slash What Next Plus. Use our offer code, WhatNext50, that is WhatNext50. And you will get a year of Slate for half off.
It's about $59. It's money that gets you early listening, ad free listening, off the record listening. You know, the good stuff. So join us. Meanwhile, here's the show.
By the time you hear this, it's going to be a Wednesday. But you know what? In my world, this episode still qualifies as a Super Tuesday. Super Tuesday is our weekly midterm check-in. It's a must listen if I do say so myself.
In the hot seat this week, Jessica Huesman, the editorial director of Vote Beat and Greg Boostin, chief political reporter over at the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Greg, Jessica, I'm so happy to have you on the show. Welcome. Thank you. And just that there's no cake this time.
Jessica's in Texas, Dallas specifically. Greg's in Atlanta, obviously. Greg is so beloved in his neck of the woods that during one of our last chats, a reader sent him a bunk cake, like in the middle of the conversation. Like the doorbell rang and it's like, here's a bunk cake. Here's a lemon bunk cake.
No point in my career has a reader ever given me a bunk cake. I wanted to talk to each of you, because I have been mulling this question, which is, how far do you think Republicans, some Republicans, I should say, are prepared to go this midterm to retain power? Do you have an answer to that, either of you? Jessica, you wanna go first? Sure.
I'll go first. You know, I think that it depends on how big the merge in is, right? I think that if it is an overwhelming victory, it's gonna be pretty difficult to do anything, regardless of your motivations or what you wanna do. If it is closer, that opens the possibilities up, I think much more broadly, in sort of a way that makes me quite nervous. Yeah, so you gotta remember here in Georgia, Jessica's right, everyone's voting for a blowout would make everyone's life easier, because 2020 is still looming over everything that happens in Georgia.
And I can also tell you the most Republican officials, they're saying, oh, let's focus on the future now in the past. I mean, I, I want to start off there, because it's been a really weird few days in politics. Like, just a few things that have happened. A rumor started going around on right-wing media that Texas Democratic Senate candidate James Tallarico was hospitalized for his mental health, and this was not true at all and disproven, like almost immediately, but it did catch fire for a hot second. The Justice Department initiated a raid on a sitting Congresswoman's home, Ilhan Omar.
I feel like even the news last week about Secretary of Defense Pete Heigseft wanted to hold a public execution. I put these things together, because these moves seem calculated to make Americans anxious, to tarnish opponents to the Republican project, and also to like cement power by brute force, like sometimes brute force that honestly, the administration may not have. But it's sort of these demonstrations of force. It sets a tone. I don't know.
Did it feel like that to you guys at all? Yeah, it does feel like that to me. And I would not forget in that list of the things that you've just listed, which all belong on that list, the prosecutions, the voting-related crime, prosecutions, especially related to non-citizen voting, and non-citizen voter registration, that the Trump DOJ is rolling out, sort of dribbling out over time, right? I think that that's also intended in the way that these other things are intended to sort of spike anxiety and sort of reduce trust in the system. In the immediate days before the election, people are voting right now.
Exactly. Early voting in Georgia started a couple of days ago, and it is already messaging from Democrats saying, put aside the anxiety, put aside all those concerns, make a plan to vote, go vote early. Greg, do you think people are listening to that advice? Yeah, I do. Today on the show, around the country, voting has begun.
But the drama might not end at the ballot box. I'm Mary Harris. You're listening to What Next. Stick around. Now more than ever, quality matters.
But so does Price and Marshall's. You don't have to choose. You can get the good stuff for less. The stuff that lasts, because there's no point in chiking your belt. If it's just going to break when you do, hit the good stuff in store at Marshall's today.
Hey, it's Adam Wild and Jack's hosts of the Adam Wild and Jack's show. What does it feel like to have a better laptop like the Dell XBS powered by Intel Core? With a premium design that's thin and light, it feels smooth. Very smooth. For a better feel in your hands and less weight on your shoulders.
With a responsive touch screen, it feels fast and precise. We're better scrolling, zooming and swiping. So everything just flows. And with long lasting battery life, it feels like nonstop energy. For a better way to work without being near a charger charger.
Feel for those who want better, the Dell XBS built for you. Introducing Pandora's Holiday Collection. This season, celebrate the ones you know by heart with a gift that says it all. Because the best gifts don't just look beautiful. They mean something too.
From engravable pieces to festive charms to lab grown diamonds. Our jewelry is made for the ones who inspire you, who've been through it all. Give a piece that says exactly what words can't. Pandora, more than a gift. Shop new styles in store or online at Pandora.net.
OK, I want to drill down into your states if we can. And Greg, I want to start with you in Georgia. Just talk about the state of the races you're covering, because there are a couple of them that I think I want to focus on. You've got the Senate race between John Ossoff, the incumbent. And a guy named Mike Collins.
And then there's the gubernatorial race, which is Atlanta, previous Atlanta Mayor, Keisha Lance Bottoms versus Republican, Rick Jackson. Where do these races stand? And what does it tell you? Yeah, they're very different races. On the Republican side, you've got Congresswoman Mike Collins, who was seen, who is sort of the more mega friendly candidate in this contest.
He embraces the name, the name, mega Mike. He's been running on a really mega pro-Trump platform. And it's sort of a throwback to campaigns we've seen in the past in Georgia. He's betting the whole house, the whole farm, I should say, on the bet that like mega voters will show up for him. And he's not really trying to appeal to the middle.
Of course, he's, you know, of course, he's, he's, he has kept hanging all over the state. But his messaging is more geared towards the party's core. But you're saying Rick Jackson is running for governor is kind of doing the opposite. He's like, I'll be sort of a moderate. Yeah, Rick Jackson, he talks more about governing like Brian Kemp than governing like Donald Trump.
So is this like an AB test to you? Where it's like, you see these two guys running in very different ways. And I know there are races too with different Democratic opponents, but very different ways. Yeah, we were seeing basically the biggest form of this sort of experiment in the Georgia stage because we have candidates running in very different strategies. Rick Jackson running more towards the middle.
He's trying to appeal to swing electoral that we call them to the ciders, the same folks who split their ticket in 2022, which in Governor Kemp and Senator Raphael Warnock, Republican and Democrat. But also Trump is coming to town this week. Rick Jackson will be with him. So he's not, he's not holding Trump at the distance that you're seeing some Republican candidates hold the president at nationally. He is still embracing him.
He's still not shying away from him. He's also just trying to appeal to those middle voters who Governor Kemp won in 2022, so decisively. Now he has some differences with the president, but nothing sharp. Nothing, nothing is big as like the war against Iran or something like that. Well, such as Trump either, right?
Like we're seeing debates between people like John Ossoff and Mike Collins. And you know, John Ossoff is pleased to bring up the fact that Mike Collins has been known for having hired people who had really racist, very obvious, racist pasts. And that's the problem, Mike. It's not just that you've hired half the third Reich to staff your congressional office and you have promoted neo-Nazi content online. It's that you're robbing your constituents to subsidize your donors.
I want to know if you. And John Ossoff, of course, used to work with John Lewis. So like has this history himself of like who he's aligned with. And he's been happy to bring that up at a debate. Oh, yeah.
I mean, there's the whole sort of global Trump politics. But then there's also the very, very personal. And the moment Mike Collins won the nomination, like within Mike Rose seconds, Senator Ossoff's campaign put out a blistering statement, essentially calling him a bigot and unfit for office and all that. And we were all kind of looking at like, OK, he's got something that we don't know yet. You know, we have our research, the Republicans who are running as Collins had their research.
But what ended up coming out over the next few weeks was his son-in-law. Mike Collins, son-in-law, the Senate candidate. Yeah, with the history of spreading neo-Nazi and anti-Semitic propaganda. Staffers who worked to, former staffers now, but who worked to help a Holocaust denier get released from prison. Grassroots activists with ties to the KKK and who say they now regret it.
But grassroots activists who were part of his convoy captains, who were part of his grassroots team, who have those affiliations. And Ossoff keeps the singers more to come. Oh, wow. So we haven't even heard it all. I mean, maybe not.
It's three weeks after. He's a fan of how I was to say that. But yeah, OK. I mean, we started off with this question of how far could Republicans go this midterm. And this is where I want to bring Jessica in because I think George is a really interesting place to ask that question.
There's a lot of funky things going on in Georgia, not with the candidates, I mean, maybe with the candidates. But like, I think when we're talking about what could happen come November, it's really looking at things like the election board. So it's like the race is one thing and where that stands and what the polling shows, which is John Ossoff seems to be in good standing, he's just in spot. It's a little closer. If you're looking at the Democrats for the gubernatorial race, once the race is over, I do think there's this question of where those ballots counted, who has authority over them.
So Jessica, can you talk about this a little bit because I know you really dug into what's going on in Georgia and why it looks different than it did in 2020. When everyone will remember, Donald Trump was, you know, calling up whoever he knew in Georgia to ask for them to wrestle up a few more votes for him. Yeah. I mean, where do you want to start in Georgia? Should we start with the state election board or?
OK, tell me. I mean, I think it's important to note up top and Greg, you should jump in at any point if I am not as specific as I should be. But the state election board doesn't have a whole heck of a lot of directives already over election operations in the state. So it's important to note that from the outset, right? It's just like a ceremonial board.
No, correct. I think you'll probably have advisory regulatory roles, but also they can be overruled. It's a five-member body that used to be chaired by the Secretary of State, but Republicans are upset at Raffensburg are kind of stripped of that power. So right now, they're kind of in this sort of liminal zone, in a sense, right? They're assembling the plane while flying.
Like, we'll find out after November 3rd, how powerful they are. They can recommend that Secretary of Raffensburg do things, and Secretary of Raffensburg can say, no, thank you. And that is basically, you know, the end of it, you know, I think. So I think Greg's right, right? They have very little power, but they make all of this news all of the time because of the way that the people who sit on the board have chosen to insert themselves and assert their authority over this space, right?
Who are these people? Do we know? They're really interesting people. You know, I think the executive director of the board is a fellow named James Mills, who's been a Republican sort of very conservative Republican leader in the state for a long time. And he was put in charge of the board because, or is sort of taken on as executive director because of the power struggle that's sort of been going on within this board for some time.
They have a chair who is appointed by Brian Kemp and is basically a moderate Republican, at least of the kind that we have today, right? Like, we would consider him moderate. So there's a chair and an executive director, and they do not agree. They need each other. It is both very entertaining and quite sad to watch a meetings a few months ago.
They had a dispute about each other's manhood for a small amount of time. They were like, stop questioning my manhood and be a man, right? This is the kind of rhetoric that you're hearing even inside of the board. So we're talking about a board that doesn't have a ton of people. Sounds really normal and positive.
Very well adjusted, I think, is how I would describe it, certainly. You know, it's a board that doesn't have a lot of power that is also at war with itself. So on the 28th of September, this board voted to adopt this resolution that's recommended a variety of actions and, you know, like light investigations into things, like expressing discontent with various parts of Georgia's election system. And it also called for the executive director to take some action to implement all of these grievances, right? And one of those was going to be sending a letter to the DOJ asking for some assistance, right?
But also included in the resolution was that all of the board members would get to sign off on any communication that was ultimately sent. Well, did that happen? Ms. Mills did not do that. And so Mr. Mills wrote it and sent it off.
It did not communicate that in my understanding to the commissioners, at least the ones that I've spoken to. And if you read the resolution and you read the letters, you can see that they're not identical, right? The letters go pretty far beyond what the resolution called for and make some pretty crazy assertions. I mean, not crazy in the sense that they're new, right? Like the same old assertions about Brad Raffensberger that are in so much of their communications will find their way into this letter.
It's been 60 years. Like we're still fighting over Brad Raffensberger. Like, wow, it's amazing how fresh that wound seems to be in Georgia. Yeah, I don't think there's any state that we're in 2020 looms. So large over everything that happens like Georgia.
And if you look back to the Georgia primaries, it was a litmus testimony of these primaries. What would you have done in 2020? And your sort of mainstream Republicans want the answer, which is I'm focusing the future about the past. That's what Kemp said throughout 2022. But some not so mainstream Republicans certainly went the other way.
And most of them lost like in 2022. But there are a few, especially in some down-down ticket races. One, I can tell you do this at the Atlanta Press Club debate for the Secretary of State Job because Raffensberger received his open. He ran for governor. He lost.
So that's even so open. But Republican Tim Fleming is going up against Democrat Penny Brown Reynolds. The Democrats running as someone who would be a stop to all this, who would say no, who would sort of reimpose force over what the state election board is doing. The Republicans saying, look, I'm going to help negotiate the sort of truths between the state election board and the Secretary of State's office. Tim Fleming, I asked him after the debate.
Hey, remember that phone call on 2021 between Raffensberger and Trump right after the election? Who side would you take? And asked him twice. And both times he basically said that Greg, I'm not answering that question, I want to focus on the future. Oh, boy.
So that's been some of the mainstay sentiment from a lot of Republicans. I will say my Collins, he not so long ago said that Trump, Trump won 2020. So there is still this is the Republican Senate candidate, the Senate candidate we were just talking about. Yeah, he says that he still says Trump won 2020. So look, it is, it is not going to be enjoyed.
I feel conflicted about this because listening to you guys, it sounds like the state elections board doesn't necessarily have a ton of power. But at the same time, the secretary of state is on his way out. And it feels like even just putting doubts about the election infrastructure into the ether creates a question in voters minds. And it's a question that you could return to say on November 4th or 5th and say, remember, we were asking questions about all of this. It just feels like we're putting the gun on the table and we just don't know what's going to happen with it post-election day.
But I don't know if you think I'm being too panicky and weird. I don't think you're being too panicky and weird. I think the one concern that I've heard commonly throughout the folks I've spoken to in Georgia about this is not that the state election board could haul off and do something crazy and that it would affect voters because that probably can't happen. But what could happen is that the letters themselves could be used as an excuse for federal intervention or more activity later. So they, human error happens somewhere in the Georgia election system and something has to be fixed.
And it is fixed, but that gives us reason to sort of put this sort of conspiratorial veneer on the top of it. I think any time that you've got official communication claiming this grave of elections since, even if they have no basis, in fact, you're sort of seeding the ground with future conspiracy plants, if you will. And so I think that they can have a huge messaging impact. And I think a lot of what we're seeing and the chaos that we're seeing and the concern that people have, that that's what it's based on, right? It's not necessarily based on whether or not they can do something or they will do something.
It's the perception they might. And every voter that I talk to right now is either angry or they're anxious and most of them are both. And if you drill down into the reasons for their anger and their anxiety, most of them don't hold water, right? Most of them are things that they're scared about, they shouldn't be scared about or rumors that they've heard that aren't true. And so when you unpack it all, everything's okay, right?
But you can't do that with every voter. And this just adds something else to unpack. Well, Greg, how close is that Secretary of State race, right? Because I feel like Ravensburger will go away at a certain point, right? He has to go.
And so then the question becomes like, who's going to, is there like a next person in line who will defend the election administration in the state? Yeah, or hold something. Yeah, exactly. Either be a Democrat who says they oppose all this or a Republican in the mold of the Ravensburger who is trying to sort of strike that balance. And that's a good question because Tim Fleming is the Republican nominee.
He's a state lawmaker. He's a former top aide to the governor. He worked in Kemp Secretary of State's office when Kemp was Secretary of State. So you know his election law. And he's again, he's trying to wade that.
He's trying to toe that tightrope between energizing the MAGA voters. He knows he needs to win. And also winning those split ticket voters by saying that 2020 is behind us. So it's kind of in between. We don't have really reliable polling for those down ticket races.
It's hard enough to kind of get a sense of the governor's race, which is neck and neck. And the big question is, you know, if the Republican wins the governor's race, does he carry the rest of the ticket below him or can he show in spot? Does the Democratic nominee for governor do the same? Or will we see it's a ticket? Will we see Republican in some offices, Democrats and others?
And that's a very real possibility in Georgia for the first time in the long time. It's a little including who's toeing who potentially on your ticket, where it's like Ossoff has gotten so much good press and seems to be surging so forcefully. Like it's a question of like, are people, is that where the energy is and what that means? And I just don't know. And I don't think we'll know until it's all over.
Well, no, soon. Yeah, I mean, Ossoff is not just going for the way he's going for the humiliation. He wants to win by double digits, which is extreme. I mean, imagine how hard that is just to win in the state like Georgia, but winning by a route in Georgia in a race that was once seen as the most competitive Senate race in the nation. I mean, Ossoff is the only Democrat running for reelection in the state that Trump won.
He only said it. The Trump won. When we come back, the shenanigans brewing in Jessica's home state, Texas. Hey, folks, this is Freddy. I'm Will.
I'm Anthony from the hit Dungeons and Dragons podcast Dungeons and Daddies. That's us. What does it feel like to have a better laptop like the Dell XPS powered by Intel Core? With a premium design that's thin and light, it feels smooth. Very smooth.
With a responsive touch screen, it feels fast and precise. And with long lasting battery life, it feels like nonstop energy with a laptop there can keep it up. Built for those who want better, the Dell XPS built for you. Our fantasy commission says for him, it's all about the friendships. Cute, Kevin.
But I disagree. Like with about 365, I get paid the second 19 goes up big with early payout and can cash out at any time before the game ends. No hard feelings, Kevin. Just faster payouts from that 365. The home of winning early must be 19 and older.
Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you were someone you know what's concerned about gambling, visit connectcentario.ca or call 1-866-531-2600 in terms of condition supply. Jessica, Texas, your state, is another state where I feel like there's this question of how far will the GOP go? Because you got Democrat James Tyler, you go looking really strong and a Senate race against Ken Paxton, attorney general there.
What's elatist? And we talked about how there was a report over the weekend that Tyler Ego is in a mental hospital, there's some such which is not true. So you can tell how crazy things are going. There were reports I think last week is when Ken Paxton's estranged ex-wife started campaigning with him, which shows how hard Paxton is trying to get this seat even though the Republican party, his ex-wife, many people are not fans. So tell me the state of play.
Man, I tell you what, being the politics friend of the group chat right now is a whole job. And it is a great idea. Yeah, what's next? Let's come up with something else. He went to the moon maybe.
You can't prove he didn't. So things are really crazy here. And I think that- And Tyler Ego would be the first Democrat to win a state of white race in a generation. Like, nights in 1994? Sir George W. Bush became governor, right?
Like an out at Unceded Ann Richards, right? It's been so long. Like, I have no conscious memory of that time in fact, right? Like, this would be a sort of like a generational shift in Texas politics. And I think what makes it different, right, from past election seasons is the candidates themselves.
And there's really no way to get around that. The last statewide Democratic candidate that we had in Texas that was sort of inspiring Democratic fur is- was better, right? And he did not- Right. He lost, not like by an impressively small margin. He was behind in the poll, only narrowly but behind.
And often within the margin of error, which gave Democrats this sort of idea that if they had succeeded in turning Texas voters out, right? Like, the voters in Texas- Texas does not vote, right? Like, Texas is one of the states with the lowest voter turnout in the nation. And so voter turnout and mobilization, especially in a place that's this big, is- and this world often is hard to do. And so the thing though, that I think differentiates this, is that Calarico has been leading in all polls for months and well outside the margin of error, right?
Like, this is just a slightly different political landscape. And as much as people think that everybody hates Ted Cruz, I actually have a neighbor who's had a- everybody hates Ted Cruz sign in his yard for years. Right? As much as already thinks that, people hate Ken Paxton so much more, so much more. It is vid- Republicans impeached him.
Do you want me to get his own party impeached him? I mean, here's one of these interesting about looking at your states together, which they feel like Georgia and Texas are at different stages of grief when it comes to the Republican party. Like when you look at what's happening in the Georgia race, you do see Republicans publicly saying like, actually I'm gonna go for all stuff. Like they're coming over, right? And they're saying it.
Whereas in Texas, it's like a race or two behind. Like, you know, like, do you have his dominant Texas? And it's dominant Texas. And like, it's very hard to beat. And so you're not seeing that, what you're seeing in Georgia.
Instead, you're seeing people fight really, really hard to maintain control. And it's just interesting. It's like different- it's like one timeline is at a slightly different place than the other. You can see that shift happening quick too. I mean, not so long ago, one of our suburbs up in Cobb County was- that's the home of New Gingrich, former Senator Johnny Isaacson, right?
It's been a Republican bastion. And there were Democrats who used to tell me like, I couldn't even wave signs on the street. You know, we had to meet secretly. We had to- it felt like it was- and now it's a cornerstone of the Democratic coalition. It is like the backbone of the suburban Democratic party in Georgia.
And Democrats can't win without winning Cobb County by a big margin. So it just shows you how like just not so long ago, I mean, 2014, it was- it was- it was- there were Democratic activists who didn't want to show their faces in the county in some sense. And now it's- now it's pretty bright blue. Yeah, but okay. But at the same time, I do feel like we have to talk about like we did in Georgia, the fundamental levels of the vote, right?
Like vote- vote- vote be recently reported. There's been this huge backlog of voter registrations in Texas. So that's a huge thing. It's just like a structural thing that exists in the state. And then I think a lot of people look at the Senate race in particular and they say, okay, well Ken- Ken Paxton is the- a G. Like what could he do if he lost to try to like pluck
at it, you know, because he's going to care if he loses. And he also may have his hands on the levers of power a little bit. So how do you look at that as a reporter and what do you anticipate? Yeah, Texas has so many- so many unique and very frustrating challenges for election administration. And I think chief among them and the thing that kind of underlies everything is that we don't have online voter registration at all.
No one can register to vote online. It is not available. You have to register on a piece of paper and that piece of paper has to sit in front of an election administrator and that election administrator has to tape it into the computer for you. And is it feeling like that's more secure? Or we don't know because everyone here is fine with online voter registration except for Governor Greg Abbott, which is the singular reason we don't have it right now.
Has he ever explained his opposition to online voting? No, I have asked him every month for 10 years. I have an automated email. Wow. And no, I have never gotten a response.
And that's how long I've been covering voting. That's how long I've been doing this. At no point has he explained his opposition to online voter registration. And so we are one of eight states that do not have it. And so the reason we always have backlogs is because of that, right?
Because when you register to vote online, it can do a lot of the verification work for you. You type in your own name. You are much less likely to miss spell your own name, especially if you have a complicated one than someone looking at handwriting on a tiny little postcard, right? So we always have these backups. Was it especially bad this year?
And it's especially bad this year because there was a lawsuit a couple of years ago about the fact we don't have online voter registration. The Motor Voter Act of 1993 requires that you be able to fully register to vote anywhere that you can get a driver's license. You can get a driver's license online in Texas, but on bomb, lost. Right? So now Texas has a little tiny bit of online voter registration.
So if you renew your driver's license online, you can register to vote. And the DMV processes those registration as supposed to pass them to the voter registrars and all 254 Texas counties, right? It's a huge state. And they just weren't doing that for a long time. There was an error in the system.
And so hundreds of thousands of registrations were not passed through. And so for example, in Bear County, which is where San Antonio is, they got 45,000 new registrations overnight. When you call those administrators, like, what are they doing? They're working on the night every night. And I will say to you, they're used to doing this because there is always a backlog.
Now, there's just a bigger one. So they scale up the plan that they implement every year. So in Bear County, they have two teams of people working between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. in two shifts, constantly processing voter registrations.
And they're going to do that until they're done. These people are shockingly efficient and they can get it done. But we as in Texas taxpayers are now having to spend money, extra money, so that we can pay more people to do this stuff. Or in a lot of cases, counties don't have that money. They can't get the money.
There is no money. And so they're having to pull other government workers off of necessary functions elsewhere to come and enter things into a computer. So you're not administering Medicaid now. You're not figuring out Tuesday's trash route. You're going to go and turn these registrations that came through from DPS and you're going to process them and verify all of the information, right?
That's what they're doing now. It's so striking to be looking at Texas and Georgia that we're talking about elections in these states where Democrats are very hopeful. But what we're talking about isn't about the candidates. Do you know what I mean? It's about the basic mechanics of getting the votes counted and getting people registered and all that sort of stuff.
And you just realize what a weight that is to bear if you are trying to win an election as someone who is a part of a party that has not been in power in that system for a long time. Yeah. I mean, in Georgia, there was a debate on candidates Democrats themselves for a long time about whether they bring up these issues, right? Because the worry was if you bring up voting rights issues, there's a second of the population who just think, oh, well, they're trying to make it harder to vote. I won't vote at all, right?
And there was that fear. And I remember when Stacey Abrams started bringing it up in 2018, you know, there was that calculus. I remember, I think I even questioned her. Isn't there this age old fear that they could dissuade people from voting? And she said, we're ready to take that risk, essentially.
You know, she, and voting rights became the major issue in the final days of that campaign. It certainly hasn't gone away. Is it up there with affordability and public safety and immigration? Some of the other issues we talk about on a daily basis? No.
But it's always there in the background. You're exactly right. And I think you add one more wrinkle to it. Those concerns about federal intervention? Well, it's already happened, right?
Wherever us, not so long ago. There was literally the sphere in the Georgia capital, Republicans and Democrats were kind of looking over their shoulder thinking, when will Brad Ruffin's were good rested? You know, there was there was a there was a legit concern that could lead to indictment, that could lead to charges. However you want to characterize them against state elections officials and other other state officials who were on Trump's naughty list, right? So, so that it just, it's still kind of pervades a lot of what we do in Georgia.
Can I see you guys each one more question? I am curious. We're talking at this particular moment. Don't Trump's approval ratings have been bad for a long time. But they keep getting worse somehow.
Like, I think we're 30 percent now. It's not great. It's a real armpit situation. But he's coming to your states or saying he's gonna come to Georgia. He's been to Texas.
Is that helping? Like Greg, is that gonna help? I think, I mean, both parties right now are saying pretend like Donald Trump's on the ballot. And so when Democrats are also saying that, that gives you everything you need to know about how Democrats view that. Republicans are in a bind, right? Because on one hand, there are Republicans who like Rich Jackson and the nominee for governor and others.
They want to run them more in the middle, but they also can't afford to have Donald Trump at their neck, right? They can't afford to have Donald Trump saying negative things about them. Rich Jackson's gonna be with Donald Trump later on this week, along with my colleagues at the Senate nominee in Georgia, in northwest Georgia. It's had a Dalton, very deep red sort of part of the state. And it'll be interesting to see what happens because I think Rich Jackson's calculation might be a part, okay?
Well, you know, if this is gonna be a Trump electorate, then we've got to lean into it. Also, his calculation has to be, if I don't show up, what do they say about me? It's kind of like your classic middle school drama division. Damn if you do, damn if you don't. Yeah, if I don't show up to this girl, to someone's party, like, what did I say negative about me?
So he's gonna show up, he's gonna be there. And Keisha Lan's bottom is quite happy to see him there because she's been saying, Rich Jackson equals Donald Trump. She's like, see, see. Now you see him on the same stage together. I mean, it's a little bit different in Texas, I feel like, because Donald Trump took his time getting to Paxton, and it doesn't seem to like Paxton very much.
Like as a human being, he doesn't seem to like him at all. It's really hilarious. His salt is clothing, his salt is luck. Yeah. So it's a little more of a forest marriage there, but I feel like they're stuck together.
It's a forest marriage that Trump entered willingly, right? And now they're stuck, right? And so he did not have to do anything, right? He wasn't intervening. Gordon was leading.
They went into it. Like, Gordon was slightly ahead when they went into that run off. Then Trump really went for it and Paxton took it. And I think this sort of chain of events is interesting when it comes to like whether Trump is helpful now. Because again, I told you, Texas doesn't vote, right?
So we're talking about a primary that has about less than a quarter of the people who are eligible to turn out to vote in that. So we're talking about an extraordinarily small number of Republicans who are very insider, who are very attached to party loyalty that went out and voted in the primary runoff, right? Which had even lower turnout than the initial primary, right? Such a small portion of the overall Texas voting base chose Ken Paxton and that runoff. And those are the ones that are really attached to Donald Trump and will probably turn out and vote in the journal instead.
Again, I don't think that that's going to be enough people. So we'll see if between now and then, I mean, early voting starts a week from today in Texas, a week from yesterday in Texas. So he doesn't have much time. But we'll see if he can sort of bridge that gap with the rest of the Republicans. But right now, no, I don't think Trump is helping Paxton at all.
He's openly insulting him saying that Paxton is willing to debate when Paxton is absolutely not willing to debate on these. Not willing to debate. And now he has to deal with that. And so I think he's just throwing curveballs into the state that I think most people would tell you are not helping the Republican party here. I think if you talk and I have, if you talk to Republicans off the record and in the quiet, they will tell you we wish he'd just stayed out of this.
If Cornyn was on this race, he would just win it. And now look what's happening. I think that's the attitude that a lot of people are starting to develop right now. Jessica, Greg, I'm super grateful for your time. I feel like I understand a lot more than I did.
That's okay. So I'm grateful. Thank you, Mary. Thank you. Greg Blustin is the chief political reporter at the Atlanta Journal Constitution.
Jessica Heusman is the editorial director at Vote Beat. And that's our show. What next is produced by Evan Campbell, Madeline Thames Duchamp and Patrick Ford. Paige Osmern is the senior supervising producer of What Next and What Next TDD. Mio Lebel is the executive producer of Podcast Here at Slate.
Ben Richmond is the senior director of Podcast Operations. And I'm Mary Harris. Go check me down in blue sky. I'm Matt Mary Harris. Thanks for listening.
Catch you back here next time. Be the Know. Invest confidently.