Stacey Abrams and Sen. Raphael Warnock remember they have to face Georgia voters in 2022

Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock and likely Democratic nominee for governor Stacey Abrams have suddenly remembered they actually have to face voters in 2022, so they decided to lie about their past positions on voter identification.

Abrams couldn’t even go two months in between her lie and her own opposition to voter ID. After objecting to voter ID requirements as recently as April, she now says it is a fallacy of GOP talking points and that “no one has ever objected” to voter ID requirements.

Meanwhile, Warnock told NBC News he has “never been opposed to voter ID,” and he didn’t know anybody who is opposed to it either. That would be news to the Raphael Warnock of 2012, 2015, or 2016. Most notably, Warnock considered voter ID requirements to be a “poll tax” in 2012. Earlier this year, he opposed Georgia’s election reform bill, as did Abrams, on the grounds it makes it more difficult to vote in the state (which was not true).

Despite President Joe Biden’s win in Georgia and Democrats’ sweep of the Senate runoffs earlier this year, Georgia is still not a blue state. Most of the electoral reforms are fairly popular there, including new voter ID requirements: 65% of Georgia voters support requiring a driver’s license number for absentee voting.

Warnock and Abrams are already tied to the decision by Major League Baseball to move its All-Star festivities out of Atlanta, thanks to the Democratic lies about Georgia’s voting law. Abrams even justified boycotts in a since-edited piece for USA Today.

Without former President Donald Trump giving away races in the state, as he did in the last election cycle, Abrams and Warnock will have a hard time finding a foil. They have already decided they must walk back their opposition to voter ID. Abrams won’t be able to tie Gov. Brian Kemp to Trump’s effort to steal the state, given that Kemp opposed it and that Abrams herself is still in denial about her 2018 loss to Kemp.

So long as Republicans don’t hamstring themselves again with foolish, Trump-based infighting, they should be able to hold off Abrams and make Warnock a one-year wonder in the Senate. Both Democrats already recognize this, given they are trying to pretend their repeated denunciations of voter ID laws aren’t out there in the open. It will be up to Georgia Republicans to capitalize.