2022 Georgia Senate Race

[Suranis]

Yowzer.

[bob]

CNN: Georgia Secretary of State Raffensperger calls for end of general election runoffs:

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger has called on state lawmakers to eliminate general election runoffs.

“Georgia is one of the only states in country with a General Election Runoff,” Raffensperger, a Republican, said in a statement on Wednesday. “We’re also one of the only states that always seems to have a runoff. I’m calling on the General Assembly to visit the topic of the General Election Runoff and consider reforms.”

Georgia’s general election runoff system, rooted in its segregationist past, says that if no candidate in a general election gets more than 50% of the vote, the race must go to a runoff four weeks later between the two candidates who received the most votes. In the runoff, the candidate with the most votes wins.

Raffensperger’s statement comes a little more than a week after Georgia’s third US Senate runoff election in two years, which saw Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock defeat Republican challenger Herschel Walker.

* * *

Raffensperger’s call nearly two years after GOP Gov. Brian Kemp signed a wide-ranging elections law that, among other things, reduced the amount of time between a November election and potential runoff.

Georgia Democrats and voting rights groups have criticized the law consistently as a barrier to voting in the state and say that certain elements target Black voters.

The origins of runoff elections go back to the 19th century, when some states began using the process in the final decades of the century to quash Black political power.

Georgia’s runoff system was first enacted in 1964, and its original sponsor sought to guarantee that candidates backed by Black Georgians could not win outright with a plurality of the vote.

There are plenty of good reasons for Georgia to get rid of its runoff system. But I don't think "because it favors the Democrats!" is one of them.

[pipistrelle]

This is old news, but for any Nikki Haley fans.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... k-deported

Outcry as Republican Nikki Haley says Raphael Warnock should be ‘deported’

The former US ambassador to the United Nations and South Carolina governor Nikki Haley told Republicans at a rally for Herschel Walker the Democrat in the Georgia US Senate race, the Rev Raphael Warnock, should be “deported”.

“I am the daughter of Indian immigrants,” Haley said in Hiram, Georgia, on Sunday. “They came here legally, they put in the time, they put in the price, they are offended by what’s happening on [the southern US] border.

“Legal immigrants are more patriotic than the leftists these days. They knew they worked to come into America, and they love America. They want the laws followed in America, so the only person we need to make sure we deport is Warnock.”
...
Heath Mayo, an anti-Trump conservative, said: “Nikki Haley calling to deport Raphael Warnock perfectly captures how those that should’ve been serious and talented leaders were really just weak toadies ready to say anything for applause. This entire generation of GOP ‘leaders’ failed their test and let the country down.”

[bob]

So Haley really is saying all leftists should be deported because they don't follow the law.

"For the record," Warnock was born in Georgia. Unlike Haley, his parents were born in the United States.

And I can name three birthers who say Haley doesn't follow the law; so, according to this lot, we can deport Haley.

[noblepa]

This is another case of RWNJs using words that don't mean what they think they mean.

You can't deport someone who was born here. To do so would be exile, not deportation. I'm pretty sure that there is no provision in US law for exile.

This is akin to their thinking that "treason" is any action that they don't approve of and completely ignore the very specific definition set out in the US Constitution.

[Foggy]

Yeah, but I have said similar things. In discussions about immigrants, I have said that I personally knew an illegal immigrant, I worked with him for about a year in an upholstery shop, and he was an artist. I met his wife and kids. They were getting As in school. And I could think of more than a few lazy, useless Americans I personally knew who I'd prefer to deport before I'd let him go. He was a good American as far as I could see.

So I know about saying "deport" in anger about people who can't be deported.

[bob]

Too also: "deport" is a legacy word; the United States no longer "deports" anyone, it "removes" them.

I assume Haley knows the difference; but I also assume her audience does not; I further assume that she knows they do not.

Regardless, Haley is saying Warnock, and hence all leftists, are not "real" Americans.

It is somewhat odd to have Nimrata Randhawa Nikki Haley play into such racist tropes.

[Foggy]

"Sports" in Spanish is deportes. Nikki just got mixed up.

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

My grandmother was an illegal immigrant (overstayed a work visa). At one point, she snuck out the back door while immigration officials were at the front door. She did safely cross back south afterwards. She eventually married my grandfather (who had the same last name and both had families across the border) and moved back north as a citizen.

Oddly, no one has ever attacked me about my Canadian ethnicity.

[jemcanada2]

My grandmother was an illegal immigrant (overstayed a work visa). At one point, she snuck out the back door while immigration officials were at the front door. She did safely cross back south afterwards. She eventually married my grandfather (who had the same last name and both had families across the border) and moved back north as a citizen.

Oddly, no one has ever attacked me about my Canadian ethnicity.

[Phoenix520]

There are very few real leftists here. We are left-ish at most.

ETA Here=USA

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

My grandmother was an illegal immigrant (overstayed a work visa). At one point, she snuck out the back door while immigration officials were at the front door. She did safely cross back south afterwards. She eventually married my grandfather (who had the same last name and both had families across the border) and moved back north as a citizen.

Oddly, no one has ever attacked me about my Canadian ethnicity.

You're just jealous my family moved north to the States. Don't worry, I still cross the southern border regularly to visit friends and family.

[RTH10260]

Herschel Walker's curious case of $595K in private jets and a donor-owned car wash

Thomas Catenacci, Joe Schoffstall
Fri, February 24, 2023 at 6:02 PM GMT+1

EXCLUSIVE: Former Republican Senate candidate Herschel Walker's campaign shelled out hundreds of thousands of dollars last year to a defunct car wash owned by a donor.

Between March 18 and Dec. 5, amid a heated race to unseat incumbent Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., Walker's campaign arm Team Herschel wired 11 payments worth $595,606 to Jetts, according to Federal Election Commission records. Other Walker-linked committees added nearly $270,000 in payments to the company during the midterm elections. Walker's unsuccessful campaign spent more on private jet travel than any other campaign during the 2022 elections, a Fox News Digital review found.

Jetts, which received the Walker campaign cash, is Jetts Car Wash, LLC, a former Kennesaw, Georgia, business initially formed in 2015, state filings reviewed by Fox News Digital show. The business' address was switched a year later to a residential address in Powder Springs, Georgia, and registered to an individual named Thomas Huff. Property records show the new address belongs to Huff, who, along with three relatives, gave maximum donations to Walker's campaign.

The car wash was ultimately dissolved in October after it failed to file the required registration information with state officials. However, Walker's campaign continued paying the business hundreds of thousands of dollars for "air charter" through December.

Huff told Fox News Digital that Walker's campaign had a "lease" but didn't elaborate on the details of such an arrangement and didn't comment on the payments to his dissolved car wash.

"I don't have any comment. You're just trying to stir something up and hurt someone that's a really good person," Huff said in a phone call before abruptly hanging up.

Huff had maxed out his donations to Walker's campaign months before the private jet payments to his car wash company began. On Oct. 18, 2021, he sent the maximum $2,900 contribution for the general election and $1,900 for the primary election, adding to the $1,000 he had given in September for the primary and bringing his total to $5,800. He also gave Walker's campaign $1,000 for "runoff" cash on Oct. 18.

And on the same day that Huff moved a bulk of his donations to Walker's campaign, Oct. 18, 2021, Huff's father, mother and wife each sent maximum contributions of $2,900 for both the general and primary elections, totaling $17,400 between the relatives.

Mallory Blount, a spokesperson for Walker's campaign, referred Fox News Digital to campaign treasurer Salvatore Purpura. And in a brief phone interview, Purpura confirmed he was familiar with Jetts Car Wash and "definitely" knew Huff but declined to comment further. Earlier this month, the FEC warned Purpura in a letter that it had identified irregularities related to the Walker campaign's finances.




https://www.yahoo.com/news/herschel-wal ... 49205.html

(original: Fox News)

[RTH10260]

Management summary of video below:

According to research presented by Ben Meiselas Huff owns a further company that actually does operate a ptivate jet. Fun fact: prior owner of said jet was one Jeffrey Eppstein (yes - that one). Ben speculates that payments went to JITT (car wash) cause it sounded more like jet operation, and did not reveal prior ownership of the plane in use. Huff is also a big Herschel donor, so campaign payment limits and paybacks may come into play.

[raison de arizona]

I'm paywalled from Daily Beast so all you get is the tweet.

Huge scandal here: Herschel Walker solicited hundreds of thousands of dollars from a billionaire donor.

The donor thought he was giving money to Walker's super PAC.

Walker had him actually give to a personal company—that he didn't disclose.
thedailybeast.com
Emails Reveal ‘Jaw-Dropping’ Herschel Walker Money Scandal
Emails show Herschel Walker solicited hundreds of thousands of dollars for his own business from a billionaire donor, with the donor ...

[RTH10260]

I don't seem to get a paywall blocking my access

Emails Reveal ‘Jaw-Dropping’ Herschel Walker Money Scandal
Emails show Herschel Walker solicited hundreds of thousands of dollars for his own business from a billionaire donor, with the donor believing he was giving to Walker's campaign.


Roger Sollenberger Political Reporter
Updated May. 04, 2023 2:54AM ET / Published May. 03, 2023 8:00PM ET

Pay Dirt is a weekly foray into the pigpen of political funding. Subscribe here to get it in your inbox every Thursday.

When Herschel Walker emailed a representative for billionaire industrialist and longtime family friend Dennis Washington in March 2022, he seemed to be engaging in normal behavior for a political candidate: He was asking for money.

But unbeknownst to Washington and the billionaire’s staff, Walker’s request was far more out of the ordinary. It was something campaign finance experts are calling “unprecedented,” “stunning,” and “jaw-dropping.” Walker wasn’t just asking for donations to his campaign; he was soliciting hundreds of thousands of dollars for his own personal company—a company that he never disclosed on his financial statements.

Emails obtained by The Daily Beast—and verified as authentic by a person with knowledge of the exchanges—show that Walker asked Washington to wire $535,200 directly to that undisclosed company, HR Talent, LLC.

And the emails reveal that not only did Washington complete Walker’s wire requests, he was under the impression that these were, in fact, political contributions.

In the best possible circumstances, legal experts told The Daily Beast, the emails suggest violations of federal fundraising rules; in the worst case, they could be an indication of more serious crimes, such as wire fraud.

But Walker—who had been schooled on campaign finance rules since his campaign launched in August 2021, according to a person involved in those conversations—appears to have dismissed the Washington team’s concerns that the money may have gone to the wrong place. When a third party informed a Washington Companies executive that the money couldn’t be used for political purposes, they raised the issue with Walker, asking at one point whether the funds should be redirected to a super PAC supporting his candidacy.

Walker never contributed any of his own money to his campaign, according to Federal Election Commission filings, and it’s unclear what happened to these particular funds. Walker may have ultimately returned the money to Washington, but he did not reroute the money to the super PAC, according to FEC filings and a person with direct knowledge of the events.

“It was good talking with you today,” Tim McHugh, executive vice president for the Washington Corporations, wrote to Walker last November. “After our call, [redacted] reached out to me and said [a person] clarified with you that any funds sent to the HR Talent account cannot legally be used for political purposes. Political contributions must go to either the Team Herschel or 34N22 accounts.”

34N22 was a super PAC supporting Walker. Walker was not allowed to solicit donations for the super PAC in excess of federal limits, which this amount of money explicitly was. But that was not McHugh’s concern; he was worried about the hundreds of thousands of dollars his boss had wired to HR Talent in March.

“We will need your assistance to get the prior contributions made to the HR Talent account in March corrected,” McHugh concluded in the email.

While Walker’s campaign was battered from the jump by a hurricane of controversies, this situation stands out.

According to the legal experts who spoke to The Daily Beast for this article, this scheme appears to not just be illegal—it appears to be unparalleled in its audacity and scope. The transactions raise questions about a slew of possible violations. In fact, these experts all said, the scheme was so brazen that it appears to defy explanation, ranking it among the most egregious campaign finance violations in modern history.



as from above tweet https://www.thedailybeast.com/emails-re ... ey-scandal

[raison de arizona]

Visual evidence of Herschel Walker back at UGA, where he re-enrolled last year after he lost a U.S. Senate bid. H/t
@RedcupGeorgia #gapol #gasen

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/hersche ... =100111649