Battleground Georgia

With the final balance of power in the next U.S. Senate still undecided, Democrats and Republicans have called the cavalry into Georgia, where a high-stakes runoff election is scheduled for Dec. 2. The runoff (required by state law when neither candidate garners 50 percent of the vote) has drawn some of the nation's best political operatives and spurred an ugly ground war. Democrats smell a filibusterproof majority of 60 within their grasp, and Republicans are desperate to stop it.

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Al Gore's former presidential campaign manager recently took over Democrat Jim Martin's operation. President-elect Barack Obama has put muscle into the effort, pouring 200-plus organizers into Georgia and recording a radio ad that began airing Friday, promising that Martin "will do everything he can in the Senate to help me change Washington." Martin's campaign is hoping Obama will pay a visit to the state in the coming days.

For incumbent Sen. Saxby Chambliss, the Republican National Committee has pumped $2 million dollars and dozens of staffers into Georgia. Party luminaries, including John McCain, Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, have stumped for Chambliss. Romney reminded voters of what's at stake, and where his party's focus is, when he warned an Atlanta crowd Friday, "We have to decide if we want two parties in Washington or only one that gets everything it wants." Not to be outdone, the Democrats have already brought Bill Clinton to Atlanta, and Gore is on the way.

The outcome in Georgia could have huge ramifications for Obama's success: Democrats now hold 58 Senate seats (including independents Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, both of whom typically vote with the Democrats) to the GOP's 40 seats. If the Dems reach 60 seats, they will hold a filibusterproof majority, making it very difficult for Republicans to block legislation. In the nation's other undecided Senate race, in Minnesota, Democrat Al Franken appears to be gaining on incumbent Norm Coleman, as the state undergoes an automatic recount.

Among the talent Democrats have deployed to Georgia recently are 12 people to work opposition research and staff the press and Internet operations (there once were just two full-time staffers filling those positions). The new staffers have had plenty to keep them busy and have honed in on a controversy surrounding Chambliss's actions in the wake of a February explosion at an Imperial Sugar refinery that killed 14. Georgia trial lawyer Mark Tate, who is suing Imperial Sugar on behalf of several of the victims, told NEWSWEEK that Chambliss improperly advised victims' relatives not to sue the refinery's management and pointed to the senator's comments at a press conference over the summer that a whistle-blower at the refinery was "on the hook" for the accident. Chambliss also badgered the whistle-blower at a recent Senate hearing. Meanwhile, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined Imperial Sugar $8.7 million for unsafe working conditions.

Tate has subpoenaed Chambliss to testify in his civil lawsuit against the refinery's management, but the senator has resisted the subpoena, saying he is protected from testifying by the Constitution's speech or debate clause. Tate said Chambliss is resisting the subpoena because he knows that if voters view him as "a hack for foreign corporations against Georgia residents and citizens in the worst industrial disaster in our history, they'll throw him out." Chambliss's spokeswoman, Michelle Grasso, dismissed the criticism as election-year mud-slinging. "Senator Chambliss is obeying the advice of counsel and the laws and rules set forth by the Senate, and it's unfortunate that Jim Martin, Mark Tate [and] the DSCC [Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee] … continue to politicize this tragedy," she said.

Democrats, in turn, say voters deserve to know about Chambliss's industry ties. "Saxby Chambliss has spent six years standing up for special interests like the sugar industry," said Matt Canter, a Martin spokesman. "He's put their profits before the people of Georgia." Canter said that Chambliss has raised tens of thousands of dollars for his campaign from the sugar industry since coming to the Senate and has a son who is a registered lobbyist for the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, where agriculture futures are traded. Chambliss's spokeswoman explains that the sugar industry donations stem from Chambliss's role as a former chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee (he is currently the committee's ranking member).

Republicans are also turning up the heat. They say Martin's views are far to the left of most Georgians and that he has voted consistently to raise taxes. "He was one of the most liberal members of the Georgia State House," says Grasso of Martin, who spent decades in the Georgia state legislature before making his way to the Public Defender Standards Council, where he was chief legal officer. "He voted against student-initiated moments of silence in schools. He voted against Gerogia's ban on partial-birth abortion ... He opposed a $100 million tax cut." Grasso also said that Martin has been soft on crime, a theme that echoes several of her boss's ads. "On any number of other social issues, voting against mandatory minimum sentences in Georgia, voting against restricting drugs within 1,000 feet of schools," she said, "Martin is left of the left."

GOP opposition researchers have highlighted Martin's work as a defense lawyer over the past two decades, and point to his legal representation of a man who ran a phone-sex business, a man who had not paid child support, and a man who was part of a scheme to bilk money from the elderly. Democrats, of course, see Martin's record in a different light. They argue that ads Chambliss has run painting Martin as soft on crime are grossly unfair. While Grasso argues that the ads are based on Martin's voting record, Democrats say they are deceptive and point to the fact that Chambliss himself has represented at least one murderer in the past (the mid-1970s to be precise). Democrats also say Martin is particularly tough on crime since his daughter was kidnapped several years ago when she was 8. "The memory of how his daughter trembled when forced to face her kidnapper in court has remained with Mr. Martin every day," Canter said. Georgians won't vote for another 10 days, but if the rhetoric thus far is any measure, by Election Day voters there will be knee deep in mud.

© 2008