Loeffler Says Conservative Get-Out-the-Vote Drive Key to Countering Stacey Abrams’ Group and Winning Georgia

Georgia Republican Sen. Kelly Loeffler speaks during a rally with U.S. President Donald Trump to support Republican Senate candidates at Valdosta Regional Airport in Valdosta, Georgia, on Dec. 5, 2020. (Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images)

Former Georgia Sen. Kelly Loeffler, a Republican, is ramping up the rhetoric around the key role of her new get-out-the-vote drive—called Greater Georgia—to counter Fair Fight, the voter participation initiative founded by former Democratic congressional representative Stacey Abrams. Loeffler has warned that if the GOP can’t successfully rebuff Abrams’s movement, they won’t win another seat in the Peach State, regardless of how appealing a candidate they field.

Loeffler said in an interview with The Washington Times that her project is “about the reality that if we don’t take steps to shore up the state’s ability to grow the conservative tent in the same way that Fair Fight has grown the liberal tent, it won’t matter who runs for office. The numbers will go against us.”

Greater Georgia is looking to engage more communities and—crucially—register more of what it estimates are some 2 million unregistered, right-leaning, voting-age Georgians.

Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) welcomes a crowd during a runoff election night party at Grand Hyatt Hotel in Buckhead in Atlanta, Georgia, on Jan. 6, 2021. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

Abrams founded Fair Fight after losing a gubernatorial bid in 2018. The group’s stated aims include advocating for progressive issues, encouraging voter participation, and fighting voter suppression.

Top Democrats, including President Joe Biden, have credited Abrams’s advocacy with helping Democrats win in Georgia, while outlets like The New York Times or BET have tipped their hats, running headlines like “The 10-year Stacey Abrams project to flip Georgia has come to fruition” or “How Stacey Abrams Courageously Dismantled Republican Voter Suppression Tactics to Flip Georgia Blue.”

Currently on the agenda for Fair Fight is opposition to several Republican-led election integrity bills in Georgia that aim to curb the use of drop boxes, change early voting hours, limit no-excuse absentee voting, and require ID for absentee voting, among other initiatives. In a tweet retweeted by Abrams, Fair Fight called the bills “voter suppression.”

Stacey Abrams speaks onstage during the 2018 Essence Festival presented by Coca-Cola at Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, Louisiana, on July 7, 2018. (Paras Griffin/Getty Images for Essence)

Acknowledging the effectiveness of Fair Fight advocacy, Loeffler said Abrams has secured a virtual “monopoly” on voter registration in Georgia.

“We’re already seeing that Georgia’s at a deficit of roughly 8,000 voter registrations a month in terms of Democrat versus Republican registrations,” Loeffler said, vowing to beat back that trend with voter engagement and registration drives, and new communications strategies to get out the conservative vote.

Loeffler, a businesswoman who lost a reelection bid in January, left office after a year. She never won an election, having been appointed to the state senate by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, a Republican, to fill a vacancy that arose when Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) retired due to health reasons.