Georgia’s vote suppression candidate Brian Kemp caught on tape
By now you probably know the story of how Brian Kemp, the Republican nominee for Governor in Georgia, is abusing his position as Georgia Secretary of State to try to suppress the vote in his favor. He’s been caught using concocted technicalities to hold up the voter registrations of tens of thousands of people, most of them minorities, in the hope of rigging the election. Now Kemp has been caught on tape.
Part of the trouble for Brian Kemp is that his Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams, in addition to being an inspiring candidate, is also a longtime expert at getting out the vote and fighting against voter suppression tactics. Rolling Stone magazine has obtained an audio tape of Kemp admitting at a private event that he’s worried about Abrams’ efforts, and in particular he’s worried about absentee ballots.
Kemp’s stunning admission on tape: Abrams’ effort to drive voter turnout is “something that continues to concern us, especially if everybody uses and exercises their right to vote — which they absolutely can — and mail those ballots in, we gotta have heavy turnout to offset that.” That’s right, Kemp thinks that if everyone exercises their right to vote, he’ll lose. His aside about how people “they absolutely can” exercise their right to vote carries zero weight coming from him, considering his extensive effort at blocking people’s right to vote.
This tape helps confirm what was already fairly clear from the start: Brian Kemp took the calculated risk of trying to suppress the vote, which he knew could backfire on him if he got caught too far in advance, because he was afraid he was going to lose if he didn’t cheat. Now that he’s been caught, several powerful entities are fighting in court to get the voter registrations reinstated, and the resulting controversy has given additional momentum to Stacey Abrams in a tight race.
