How David Perdue has evolved as a candidate

The cramped campaign RV had just emerged from a dusty side road after its second Chick-fil-A stop of the day when it disgorged David Perdue, a former Fortune 500 executive who, on this musky afternoon, was beseeching a few dozen Griffin retirees to vote for him in Tuesday’s Senate runoff.

The rain pattered outside while two camera-wielding trackers waited to pounce on a miscue within as Perdue stepped to the front of the cramped room. This isn’t how he expected to spend the tail end of his lucrative business career, and it certainly isn’t how his wife, Bonnie, expected to spend her first years as a grandma.

Since joining the race a year ago, Perdue has weathered head-slapping gaffes, spent more than $3 million out of his own pocket to power his campaign and watched as most Republican kingpins backed his rival, U.S. Rep. Jack Kingston.