by Jill Nolin, Georgia Recorder [This article first appeared in the Georgia Recorder, republished with permission]

October 27, 2024

Second gentleman Doug Emhoff swung through metro Atlanta Sunday to fire up supporters of Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the final week of early voting in Georgia.

But he also came with a message for young voters, particularly the young men who are being courted so aggressively by the Trump campaign: Do your own research. 

“I’m just begging them to go and actually do their homework because he’s not your friend, young people,” Emhoff said at an event at Nouveau Bar and Grill in Jonesboro, just south of Atlanta in deep blue Clayton County.

“With the dancing and going into the wrestling matches and the football games and McDonald’s, talking about Arnold Palmer, not the drink,” Emhoff said, referring to off-color remarks former President Donald Trump made last week in Pennsylvania about the legendary golfer. “That’s to distract. So, young people, do the homework, do the research, because they’re going to affect you a lot longer than folks my age.”

It was a message the 60-year-old repeated at multiple campaign stops on Sunday.

“When I talk to young people, they think he’s cool, they think he’s funny, and they see him doing these podcasts and going to ball games. It’s all a distraction. Do the research,” Emhoff said to supporters at Pontoon Brewing in Sandy Springs.

Emhoff also talked about his faith during the visit to the Sandy Springs brewery, sharing that the mezuzah at the front door of the vice president’s residence came from a temple in Atlanta where Martin Luther King Jr. preached.

“So, it’s got a connection to the Civil Rights Movement. It’s got a connection to the Jewish people,” said Emhoff, who said he has “lived openly and proudly as a Jew in the vice president’s residence.” 

Emhoff and Harris’ sister Maya also sought to drive home the importance of Georgia, which is seen as one of seven swing states this year.

“I’m just here to say keep going. Keep going,” Maya Harris said in Jonesboro Sunday, just one week after Kamala Harris visited a church there.

Maya Harris called on supporters to vote “in numbers that are so overwhelming that we leave no doubt about where Georgia and this country stands.” 

Both campaigns have been pushing supporters to vote early, which is a reversal for Trump. About 2.8 million people have already voted in Georgia, which is slightly more than the number of ballots cast at this point in the 2020 presidential election. 

On Sunday, Emhoff also picked up pizza from Triple Jays Pizzeria, a Black-owned restaurant in Midtown, to drop off for volunteers at a campaign office in DeKalb County.

The second gentleman’s visit is part of the flurry of campaign events in Georgia as both camps vigorously target the Southern battleground state. Polls continue to show a tight race in Georgia.

But Sheila Bush, a Jonesboro resident who came out to see Emhoff Sunday, said she is feeling good about Harris’ chances in Georgia, though she acknowledged that some voters she encounters are still skeptical. For younger voters especially, economic concerns can weigh heavily, and she said she is often pushing back on what she says is the perception that they fared better under Trump.

“I think they’re coming along. We just have to keep encouraging them to vote,” she said. 

This was Emhoff’s third visit to Georgia just this month.

Emhoff visited Savannah as early voting started in Georgia. He was also here to kick off Atlanta’s pride festivities, appearing at metro Atlanta events with film star and Smyrna native Julia Roberts and prominent Georgia Democrats like Stacey Abrams and U.S. Sen. Raphael Warnock. 

And the Harris-Walz campaign said Thursday’s massive rally in Clarkston featuring rockstar Bruce Springsteen and former President Barack Obama was among its largest events.

Democratic vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz is also set to campaign in Columbus and Savannah this Tuesday as part of what the campaign called an early voting blitz. His visit will happen on the same day that former first lady Michelle Obama speaks at a nonpartisan event in Atlanta.

On the Republican side, a recent string of visits has centered on vote-rich metro Atlanta, as former President Donald Trump works to peel off votes in areas that have been Democratic strongholds. In previous elections, voters were more likely to catch a Trump rally in smaller communities outside of Atlanta, like Dalton or Valdosta. He famously lost Georgia in 2020 by less than 12,000 votes.

Trump will be back Monday for a rally in Atlanta, just days after vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance spoke at an event Saturday in downtown Atlanta. The former president filled Gas South Arena in Gwinnett County just last week, as both campaigns compete for votes in one of the most diverse counties in the country.

“Doug Emhoff has consistently stood by Kamala Harris’ failed policies, policies that have devastated Georgians,” said Morgan Ackley, the Trump campaign’s communications director in Georgia. “His visit to the state will not hide the fact that Georgians are still suffering from nearly four years of Kamala Harris’ disastrous agenda.”

Georgia Recorder is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Georgia Recorder maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor John McCosh for questions: info@georgiarecorder.com. Follow Georgia Recorder on Facebook and X.