Trump Abandons David Perdue as Georgia Gov. Candidate Gets Clobbered In Polls: Report

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Former President Donald Trump has ceased supporting former Sen. David Perdue in the GOP gubernatorial primary in Georgia ahead of Tuesday’s election, reported NBC News on Thursday.

Perdue trails Gov. Brian Kemp by 32 points in a Fox News poll published on Wednesday. In the RealClearPolitics average, Kemp leads Perdue by almost 25 points.

Trump sees “a lackluster campaign effort from Perdue” and “isn’t planning to make any more personal appearances in Georgia [on] Perdue’s behalf,” reported NBC News.

Trump has held a grudge against Kemp since the governor refused to overturn the 2020 election.

Perdue had no money allocated toward TV ads in the final week of the campaign, while political action committees supporting him spent $280,000 on on-air ads. Meanwhile, Kemp’s campaign is expected “to spend more than $1 million in ads during the campaign’s homestretch,” while a PAC backing him is set to spend $700,000 on ads.

“David Perdue doesn’t have commercials on TV and went dark two weeks ago, but Kemp is up,” pollster Matt Towery told NBC News. “It’s almost impossible to win a major race when a popular governor is bombarding you on TV and you’re dark.”

The winner of the race will face Stacey Abrams. Were Kemp to win the GOP primary, the general election would be a rematch of the 2018 race, which Kemp won.