NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly talks to former Georgia Lieutenant Governor Geoff Duncan, a lifelong Republican, about why he’s supporting Vice President Kamala Harris in this election Harris).
MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Geoff Duncan is the No. 2 elected official in Georgia. He served as lieutenant governor from 2019 to last year. When I tell you he’s a lifelong Republican, you might raise your eyebrows as he delivers the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention this summer.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
JEFF DUNCAN: Let me make this clear to my Republican friends watching at home – if you vote for Kamala Harris in 2024, you are not a Democrat, you are a patriot.
(cheer)
KELLY: Geoff Duncan is with me now at WABE Studios in Atlanta. Jeff Duncan, welcome.
Duncan: Thank you. I approve this message.
KELLY: (Laughter) What was the turning point for you, a lifelong Republican?
DUNCAN: Simply put, it’s Donald Trump. As I watched him govern for four years as a state representative and then as president, my heartburn began to intensify. I held my nose as long as I could before I finally lost patience with a man who was ignorant and unprepared to lead a country.
KELLY: Do you still consider yourself a Republican?
Duncan: Of course. Absolutely. I’ve been a lifelong conservative – you know, I was a state representative for five years and then ran for lieutenant governor. I think the most serious charge against me is that “Jeff Duncan is too conservative to be a statewide elected official.”
But there’s one important difference – I’m conservative. I’m just not angry. I feel like this is an opportunity to build consensus, and my four years as lieutenant governor in Georgia gave me the opportunity to test this thesis, and you can work with the other side. You can adopt Ronald Reagan’s dictum, you know, 80 percent of the people you spend time with are friends and allies, not 20 percent traitors. As Lieutenant Governor and Senate President, I saw this happen firsthand, working with both Democrats and Republicans.
KELLY: Why do you think so few of your fellow Republicans haven’t followed suit? Because the list of prominent Republicans who made the decision is very short.
Duncan: I think there are two parts to people. Of course, everyone listening knows this in their business lives. They know this in their personal lives. But there are public ones and private ones. I don’t know what the exact percentage is, but a large number of Republicans agree that Donald Trump is not the future of the party. They did not support his activities. They did not support his actions. But you only heard it privately, right? You know, publicly swimming against the tide can take a huge toll on your life. I mean, to this day I still…
KELLY: Well, that might be political suicide.
Duncan: Well, yes—even more than that. As a father raising three kids and being married to my high school sweetheart, you know, getting calls from them saying, hey, we just got another death threat or someone was at one of us at the grocery store or at the theater Scream or – you choose your position.
Kelly: That happened?
Duncan: That’s not – oh, absolutely not. It’s not very interesting, but I get it. I just chose to take a different path. I chose to stand up and try to make a change.
KELLY: Have the Democratic Party done enough to welcome people like you – to understand that you’re not planning to join the Democratic Party, but you want to work with them?
Duncan: They’re awesome. You know, to be honest, I don’t have a single person on whom my position differs from their position, obviously, on many issues – you name the issue – knowing that I’m on the other side of the numbers on these issues.
But, you know, I saw this test in the state Senate when I was Senate President. You know, I’ve never considered anyone in the Democratic Party an enemy. We were just on opposite sides of the issue, and, you know, one of the lessons I learned was – we had a large enough majority in the Senate that we could pass anything we wanted to pass in Georgia, essentially, just because We have a sufficient Republican majority. But I always feel that the legislation we ultimately send to the governor is of better quality when it has bipartisan votes and support.
Look, the president’s job has nothing to do with the everyday things that affect all of us – our transportation, our schools, our community safety. But the president’s most important job is to set the tone and tone—the direction—of the country. I can’t wait for that leader to emerge who actually cares more about the future of this country than the future of their political careers. We’ll see.
Kelly: What’s your future? It sounds like you’re not tired of politics yet.
Duncan: I don’t know. You know, I still have a lot of work to do to heal and rebuild the party. I have dedicated my life to this. I was not defeated for the lieutenant governor position. I chose not to run because I felt it wasn’t a big enough platform to do the work I needed to do. If the Republican Party regroups and shows a willingness to take its medicine, I would absolutely love to get back into politics. But until then, there’s work to be done.
KELLY: Jeff Duncan, thank you.
Duncan: Thank you very much.
KELLY: As you heard, Geoff Duncan, the former lieutenant governor of Georgia and a lifelong Republican, talks with us about why he voted for Kamala Harris. We spoke with him as part of our We, the Voters series. You can find more stories like this at “We, the Voters” at npr.org.
Copyright © 2024 NPR. all rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and Permissions The page is located at www.npr.org For more information.
NPR transcripts are created by NPR contractors under emergency deadlines. This article may not be in final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR programs is the audio transcript.
