Friday’s headline at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution may lead one to believe that failed Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams is as popular in the state as Sen. David Perdue, a Republican she may run against in 2020.
The headline, “AJC poll: Favorability for David Perdue, Stacey Abrams nearly the same,” is wildly misleading. The paper will be able to get away with claiming the headline is “technically true,” but it leaves out important information that would give readers a different view of the two politicians.
Perdue’s favorability stands at about 47%, according to the poll. Abrams’ favorability stands at about 45%. The difference here, however, is that the two politicians’ unfavorable ratings are vastly different.
Just 25% of those polled had an unfavorable opinion of Perdue. For Abrams, 45% view her unfavorably. That means Perdue has a +22 favorability, while Abrams breaks even. As the AJC pointed out, Abrams’ favorability has also dropped seven points in the past three months, while her unfavorable rating has increased five points. That’s not good, and certainly not the impression given by the headline, which makes it seem like she and Perdue would be neck-and-neck in a senate race.
At this point, Abrams has the name recognition to get her boosted in the polls. That might change during an actual campaign, especially if she is still claiming she won the governor’s race despite losing by 55,000 votes.
Abrams hasn’t even announced whether she plans to seek the senate race or not. She may not even run. If she did, it would be another example of the Democrat Party allowing a failure to seek higher office. In Texas last year, Robert “Beto” O’Rourke lost to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX). He couldn’t win a senate seat, yet now he’s running for president and is polling well among the other announced candidates.
Abrams lost the Georgia governor’s race yet is mulling either a U.S. senate bid or a presidential run. AJC reported last week on other Democrats who may challenge Perdue, including Columbus Mayor Teresa Tomlinson, business leader Sarah Riggs Amico, Jon Ossoff (who you may recall also failed to win an election) and a host of current and former state representatives. Other than Ossoff, these other candidates aren’t running for office after a recent, major failure.
But if Democrats in Georgia really want Abrams, that’s fine. Maybe she’ll lose to Perdue and spend the next year claiming she won both the governor’s race and the senate race.