ATLANTA – U.S. Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., picked up endorsements Friday from three former Georgia Republican senators, including the lawmaker he succeeded in Congress.
Supporting Perdue are former Sens. Johnny Isakson, who retired from Congress at the end of last year; Saxby Chambliss, who left Washington in 2014 to be succeeded by Perdue; and Mack Mattingly, elected in 1980 as Georgia’s first Republican U.S. senator since Reconstruction.
“For the better part of five years, I had the honor of working directly with David to represent Georgia in the United States Senate,” Isakson said. “I’ve seen firsthand how dedicated he is to improving our health care system, taking care of our veterans and expanding opportunities for our young people. We need David Perdue to keep fighting for us in the Senate.”
The show of unity behind Perdue is in sharp contrast to Georgia’s other U.S. Senate race, which has divided Republicans.
Gov. Brian Kemp appointed Sen. Kelly Loeffler, R-Ga., late last year to succeed Isakson on an interim basis, and the governor continues to back her, as does Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan and Attorney General Chris Carr.
Other GOP leaders, including Georgia House Speaker David Ralston, are supporting U.S. Rep. Doug Collins, R-Gainesville, a former member of the General Assembly who is leaving the House to run for the Senate. Ralston, R-Blue Ridge, endorsed Collins on Thursday.
Former Gov. Nathan Deal hasn’t endorsed either Loeffler or Collins but attended a Collins rally last week in Gainesville.
Unlike Perdue’s reelection bid against Democratic challenger Jon Ossoff, which is limited to two major-party candidates, Loeffler and Collins are locked in a free-for-all contest that includes multiple Republicans and Democrats.
Some Republicans pushed during this year’s General Assembly session to set up a June primary for Loeffler’s seat to avoid pitting two or more GOP candidates against each other on the general election ballot in November but were unsuccessful.
Perdue also landed an endorsement Friday from Nancy Coverdell, the widow of former Republican U.S. Sen. Paul Coverdell, who served from 1993 until his death in 2000.
ATLANTA – First-time unemployment claims in Georgia declined last week for the sixth week in a row, the state Department of Labor reported Thursday.
For the week ending Aug. 29, initial claims totaled 51,283, down 5,485 from the previous week.
During the 24 weeks since the coronavirus pandemic forced Georgia businesses to shut down, the labor department has paid out more than $3 billion in regular state unemployment benefits, more than the last seven years combined.
“I don’t believe anyone would have imaged that we would disperse more than $3 billion,” Georgia Commissioner of Labor Mark Butler said Thursday. “It is a testament to my staff here at the [labor department], who have processed more than 3.5 million claims.”
Meanwhile, the labor agency is in the testing phase prior to rolling out federal unemployment checks of $300 per week under an initiative President Donald Trump announced last month. The president acted after an earlier federal program that had been providing unemployed Americans $600 a week expired and Congress failed to renew it.
The $300 checks authorized under the new Lost Wages Assistance (LWA) Program should begin going out by the middle of this month.
The program is limited to an initial five weeks, and Georgia has qualified for all five. After that, states will be required to request the money every week through Dec. 27 or the termination of the program, whichever comes first.
From March 21 through the end of last week, the accommodation and food services job sector accounted for the most initial unemployment claims in Georgia with 858,572 claims. The health care and social assistance sector was next with 422,810 claims, followed by retail trade with 387,184.
More than 148,000 jobs are listed online at EmployGeorgia.com for Georgians to access. The labor department offers online resources for finding a job, building a resume and assisting with other reemployment needs.
ATLANTA – Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jon Ossoff raised more than $4.7 million last month, a total his campaign said marked the highest single-month fund-raising total of any Georgia candidate in Senate history.
“Georgians from all walks of life are united behind Jon’s message of rebuilding an economy that supports flourishing small businesses and working families, attacking the rampant corruption in Washington and ensuring every Georgian has affordable and accessible health care,” Ellen Foster, Ossoff’s campaign manager, said Thursday.
With a series of polls calling the race between Ossoff and incumbent Republican Sen. David Perdue a tossup, Perdue’s GOP backers have been pouring money into his campaign as well.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Senate GOP’s fund-raising arm, has given Perdue nearly $5 million since mid-July, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Another $6.1 million has come from the Senate Leadership Fund, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s political action committee, with $13.5 million more to come by Election Day, Politico reported.
Ossoff, an investigative journalist, won the Democratic nomination to challenge Perdue in a crowded primary in June. Perdue captured the Republican nomination unopposed.
While this is Ossoff’s first statewide bid for elective office, he ran for a congressional seat in a special election in 2017, losing to Republican Karen Handel in a race that became the most expensive in the history of the House of Representatives.
Businessman Perdue, who served asCEO of several companies including Dollar General before being elected to the Senate, is seeking his second six-year term.
ATLANTA – Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Jon Ossoff will release a campaign ad Thursday linking his background as an investigative journalist to his anti-corruption agenda.
“Corruption in Washington has infected both parties,” Ossoff says in the ad. “They’re too busy serving lobbyists to serve us.”
In the 30-second ad, titled “Together,” Ossoff pledges to push for a ban on corporate campaign contributions and to crack down on price gouging by health insurance and pharmaceutical companies, which he says generates money they use “to buy off Congress.”
“Together, we can end corruption and make health care affordable,” he says in the ad.
After serving as a congressional aide, Ossoff became managing partner and CEO of Insight TWI, a London-based company that produces documentaries about corruption in foreign countries.
In the last three years, the company has produced investigations of ISIS war crimes, high-level corruption in international sports, war crimes committed by international peacekeepers and death squads that target children.
Ossoff won the Democratic nomination in June to challenge Republican U.S. Sen. David Perdue’s bid for a second six-year term.
This year’s Senate campaign is the second for Ossoff. He lost a special election in Georgia’s 6th Congressional District in 2017 to former Republican U.S. Rep. Karen Handel, a race that ended up becoming the most expensive in the history of the House of Representatives.
Plant Vogtle’s Unit 3 (far left) is scheduled to be completed in November 2021.
ATLANTA – The Plant Vogtle nuclear expansion project remains on schedule, Georgia Power Co. reported in a filing with the state Public Service Commission (PSC) this week.
The construction of two additional nuclear reactors at the site south of Augusta is about 87% complete, according to the latest progress update the Atlanta-based utility submits to the PSC every six months.
The first of the two new units is scheduled to go into service in November of next year followed by the second unit one year later.
In the report, Georgia Power asks the commission to verify and approve $701 million in capital costs incurred during the first half of this year.
While the completion schedule hasn’t slipped, the coronavirus pandemic is affecting the pace of the work. As of the end of last month, 800 workers at the site had tested positive for COVID-19 since the beginning of the pandemic.
The company laid off 20% of the project’s workforce last April.
“The project’s reduction in workforce during April 2020 helped to slow the spread of the pandemic on site but also contributed in part to the increased costs, productivity challenges and milestone schedule delays,” Georgia Power wrote in its filing. “These impacts were the results of circumstances outside of the project team’s direct control.”
Some are skeptical that the utility can complete the project under the current timetable. Independent experts retained as consultants by the PSC’s staff testified earlier this summer the schedule is likely to slip further behind and that the final cost probably will go up by at least $1 billion.
The cost of the Plant Vogtle nuclear expansion to Georgia Power and three utility partners has nearly doubled from the original estimated price tag of $14 billion the PSC approved 11 years ago. Much of the increase was due to the bankruptcy several years ago of Westinghouse Electric, the original prime contractor.
Southern Nuclear, like Georgia Power a subsidiary of utility giant Southern Co., has since take over management of the project.
Despite criticism from project opponents that the nuclear expansion has become more expensive than alternative sources of power generation, Georgia Power continues to maintain that finishing the project is in the best interest of the utility’s customers.
“Economic analysis shows that completion of the project provides approximately $3.9 billion in relative savings for customers over a gas-fired combined cycle alternative,” Georgia Power wrote in the filing.
Georgia Power also argues nuclear power is key to a diverse energy mix that will protect customers from the impacts of fossil-fuel cost volatility.
