MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Well, my next guest has a different take on the upcoming election. As chair of the Georgia Republican Party, Josh McKoon is doing everything he can to put Donald Trump back in the White House. He is here with me live in the studios of WABE here in Atlanta. Josh McKoon, welcome.
JOSH MCKOON: Thank you.
KELLY: Give us a quick taste of what these next few weeks look like for you, like, the top one or two things the Georgia GOP is doing to get the vote out.
MCKOON: Well, it's canvassing, like what we just heard. It's making phone calls. It's that relational kind of politics and really reminding our voters to get out early and take advantage of the three-week in-person early voting process here in Georgia.
KELLY: I've heard a lot of emphasis from Republicans we're talking to here in Georgia about early voting and the importance. Is that new? Why?
MCKOON: It is new. And the reason it's important is, things happen on Election Day. You know, your car breaks down, child gets sick, other things happen. We want our voters to make a plan and make sure they get out and bank their vote during that three-week period, because once you do that, you come off the list - right? - of voters that we need to turn out. And we can have more of a focus on the low propensity voters, those voters that vote maybe once in every three elections, that we believe will decide the election here in Georgia.
KELLY: Got it, so you're not knocking on doors of people who are already planning to vote or already have voted.
MCKOON: Exactly.
KELLY: Talk to me about the current landscape in Georgia. As you know, earlier in the summer, I think fair to say Democrats had kind of given up on Georgia. Donald Trump was polling way out front. Now the state is back in play. The latest Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll out today shows the race has tightened since July. It's now pretty much neck and neck. Why do you think that is?
MCKOON: Well, we've always thought Georgia would be a competitive state. We were not going to take it for granted at all, not just the Georgia Republican Party but the Trump campaign and the RNC. President Trump has held a pretty consistent polling lead since October, regardless of who his opponent is. You know, he was...
KELLY: It's now within the margin of error, though, so I'm wondering why.
MCKOON: It's a three-point lead. It was a five-point lead in the previous poll. I think it's just some statistical noise. What's really important, if you look behind the top line number there, is that the Republicans here in Georgia are united behind President Trump - over 90% saying they're committed to voting for him - whereas Vice President Harris has yet to close the deal with a substantial number of Black voters - under 80% there. And, you know, we're eight weeks out from the election. It's getting very late to close the deal.
KELLY: The last - I think we're inside of seven now.
MCKOON: Right.
KELLY: Yeah, we're getting there.
MCKOON: We're getting very, very late in the process to close the deal. And so I'm very encouraged by the numbers that you look at in the AJC poll.
KELLY: Big picture - I want to tick through a couple of things that are different in this election year than when Donald Trump was running the last time, because I would love to hear your take on whether they are important. Do you care that he is now a convicted felon?
MCKOON: No, absolutely not. You know, it's a longer conversation. But essentially, that whole process, it's very concerning as an American about the weaponization of the criminal justice system in a way that I think has vast ramifications beyond this election. But no, I think the reason you see over 90% of Republicans in Georgia are rallied behind President Trump is that doesn't really register.
KELLY: For moderate voters, for swing voters - who Trump is going to need - who do care, who say this is a deal breaker for them, what's your message?
MCKOON: My message would be that this is a case of prosecutorial misconduct that I believe is going to be reversed on appeal. It has to do with entries on a ledger. It's not even really dealing with actions that President Trump took himself, and it has a lot more to do with partisan prosecutors than it has to do with the conduct of this president.
KELLY: Well, it has to do with hush money payments to an adult film star. And a New York Jury found him guilty on 34 counts. But let me move you to another thing. Trump tried to overturn the results of the last election, the 2020 election, after Joe Biden won. You're an elected official. You care about our democracy. Does that bother you?
MCKOON: So I care about the law quite a bit, and here in Georgia, the way you lawfully contest an election is you file a lawsuit. And that's what President Trump did. And he was entitled to his day in court within 20 days of serving that lawsuit. He never got that day in court in Georgia. And unfortunately, the failure of the judicial system to act on these cases, win, lose or draw, right? Whether they upheld his challenge or not contributed...
KELLY: And to be clear, he lost. Every single judge...
MCKOON: Well, unfortunately...
KELLY: Before the case was brought on, they ruled against him.
MCKOON: There was never a hearing. There was never a hearing, so there was never any adjudication on the merits here in Georgia. The claims he made were never reviewed by a court. And that's unfortunate because it has fed into a lot of the issues around the 2020 election. But no, I don't think that issue is going to be one that is decisive for voters. What the voters I talk to care about are this economy and what's been going on with this economy for the last 3 1/2 years. They're very concerned about their personal economy, the economy of their family. They want this economy to turn around, and most of them don't see the current vice president doing something new or different than what's been done for the last 3 1/2 years.
KELLY: Since you raised the economy, let's stay there a second. The federal debt is large. The tax cut that Donald Trump wants would make it larger. Does that bother you? Does he have a plan to reduce the debt?
MCKOON: Well, if you look at when President Trump was in during his first administration, there was significant tax relief, tax relief that's scheduled to expire during the administration of the next president. And federal revenues increased during that time. So it's a question of restraining spending in certain areas as the additional revenue comes in. But unleashing American innovation, making sure that the tax policy is sane and makes sense, is a good thing. It's good for the American economy. It's good for workers. It's good for creating an economy that works for everyone.
KELLY: We've got one minute left. One more question that I want people to be able to hear your thinking on. People who worked for Trump the first time around - including his own vice president, his White House chief of staff, his defense secretary - have said he is unfit to serve again. Does that give you second thoughts?
MCKOON: No. There's the professional class in Washington, D.C., that's very interested in, in my view, lining their own pockets more so than the kind of change this country needs. I think voters here in Georgia and around the country want a change agent that's going to improve this economy, that's going to get sanity at the border.
KELLY: OK.
MCKOON: And that candidate is President Donald Trump.
KELLY: Josh McKoon, chair of the Georgia Republican Party. He joined us here live in the studios of WABE. Josh McKoon, thank you.
MCKOON: Thank you.
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