Way back in 2020, the Old FART famously asked Governor Kemp and Georgia Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, to find him 11,000 votes, which, much to their credit, they refused to do. Since then, Trump has hated both men and Georgia. Trump even went so far as to give Kemp the “Little” moniker, recently referring to him as “Little Brian, little Brian Kemp. Bad guy.”

He was so angry, he helped ensure that both Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock were elected to the Senate AND he helped Warnock get re-elected in 2022.

Until recently, he would ramble into his 2020 election denialism grievance, and start bad mouthing Kemp, but now he’s stopped. I guess the Old FART finally realized that he needs Kemp in Georgia because popular governor. And, now the governor is campaigning and fundraising for him.

Explaining Kemp’s About Face on Supporting Trump

What happened? How do we explain this set of strange bedfellows that politics has presented us? Why is Kemp, who claims he didn’t vote for Trump in the primary, supporting him now? What’s changed? The Old FART certainly hasn’t changed. He’s still the same vindictive, cruel, felonious, self-absorbed, self-serving, blundering, blustering, traitor he’s always been, so it must be something in Kemp that changed, right? Or is it?

Kemp’s History of Ratfucking Elections

Let’s try to figure out what motivates Kemp in terms of politics and holding office by looking back at the last three election cycles.

  • THE 2018 GOVERNOR’S RACE. He rigged the election in his favor by repeatedly purging the Georgia state voter rolls of likely, i.e. Black, Democratic voters. Remember, Kemp was Secretary of State during that election and could manipulate the voter registration as he saw fit, and he barely squeaked out a victory over Stacey Abrams. Obviously, Kemp isn’t above playing dirty.
  • THE 2020 ELECTION. While Kemp was willing to help himself win an election, he wasn’t willing to blatantly break laws for someone else’s political gain. What’s more, the 2020 version of his voter roll high jinks didn’t even help Perdue or Loeffler win their senate races, and they didn’t help Trump. Clearly, there is a limit to the ratfucking that Kemp is willing to engage in and for whom he’s willing to help with it.
  • THE 2022 GOVERNOR’S RACE. He beat Abrams by a fair amount, officially 7.5%, but, Warnock won his senate race with only 51% of the vote, so there is a limit to the governor’s coattails and the effectiveness of his voter roll games.

In fact, given this summary of the cheating that Kemp was willing to do to get himself elected, you might could say, he’s only in it to help himself. That conclusion buggars the question, how does helping Trump, help Kemp?

How Does Helping Trump, Help Kemp?

Trump has been a net negative for Georgia. You can rightfully lay the loss of their senate seats at Trump’s feet, and it took two elections to get them good well lost. He helped elect a radicalized MAGA state legislature that is trying to monkey with the certification process of the 2024 election and other election shenanigans. All of this has to amount to, at least, a headache, if not a real pain in the ass for Kemp.

Kemp Remains Viable as a Future Republican Candidate

Here’s what I think: Kemp believes to the depths of his shallow narcissistic soul that the very best thing for Georgia is for him to continue having a viable political career after he term limits out of the governor’s office (Georgia has a “complicated” term limit deal, involving math and thinking). In his mind, there could be no worse catastrophe for Georgia than for him not to be sitting in some statewide elected office representing his white constituency.

He’s got to preserve his viability as a candidate at all costs even if it means he might could get Mitt Romney’ed or Marco Rubio’ed by Trump. Whatever humiliation the Old FART could inflict on him would be worth it to preserve his ability to be a future Georgia Senator, Governor (I told you, it was complicated), or, hell, even president — you know that delusion is dancing through his little egomaniacal mind — so as popular as he is in Georgia, he has to maintain his appeal to MAGA voters for his future prospects.

Kemp didn’t stand up to no Trump in 2020 as some patriotic act, neither. It wasn’t his deep love for democracy, his reverence for the Office of the Presidency, or his devotion to good governance that gave him his spine when few other Republicans had found theirs; it was his deep love, reverence, and devotion to his own future prospects for elected office.

Let Me Know What You Think in the Comments

And that, in my mind is what is driving him to campaign for Trump now, but I’d love to hear what you think. Please let us know in the comments!

Image Attribution

This image was found on, The Current, using Creative Commons License search on DuckDuckGo.