Brian Kemp might be hoping that voters forget the shotgun-toting image that helped him win the GOP nomination. Georgia Democrats are doing everything they can to remind them.
The state party launched a scathing new attack ad Thursday that opens with footage of that controversial commercial, which featured Kemp pointing a shotgun toward his daughter's date.
Then it ticks through several of the sagas that followed the secretary of state through the primary: Questions about a state board's renewal of massage parlor licenses despite sexual misconduct allegations. And litigation involving a $500,000 loan that Kemp secured for a struggling agriculture firm accused of defrauding farmers.
“Unaccountable. Reckless. Irresponsible,” the ad’s narrator says, as grainy images of the Republican flash across the screen. “These are not the traits of a leader. Not by a long shot. Brian Kemp. Cannot be trusted.”
It's the harshest attack yet from allies of Democrat Stacey Abrams, though it pales in comparison to the negative attacks leveled by Republican Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle against Kemp ahead of the runoff.
And for Kemp, it underscores a challenge he’s faced since his dominating runoff victory.
Those bawdy images of shotguns, explosions and chainsaws helped him win the Republican nomination. But they’re liabilities in a general election where a more mainstream electorate will decide the victor.
It's why he's shelved the shotgun and replaced it with ads featuring his smiling wife Marty leafing through a photo album – or attacks on Abrams' law-and-order record aimed at winning over suburban women.
And Democrats are more than eager to drive home the image of that primary-era version of Kemp in the closing days of the election.
Watch the ad here:
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