Dalton Republican to Challenge Governor’s Bid for Reelection

Pennington had hinted at a run for months. Earlier this year in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, he suggested Deal lacked “true conservative” principles. Pennington now says Georgia needs a “proven, job creating businessman.”

“I want to change the economic direction of the state itself. We need good new businesses starting in Georgia and growing in Georgia,” said Pennington.

In response, Deal touts his record on jobs and the economy. He cites Caterpillar and Baxter as examples of the state successfully attracting companies.

“I think our job numbers are great. 177,000 since I’ve become governor – of new jobs in our state. 69,000 were attributable to efforts of the state of Georgia through our economic development activities.”

But Pennington said most of those companies are from out of state and have relocated to take advantage of cheap labor. He cited a study showing average incomes in Georgia have dropped from 25^th to 40^th nationally over the last ten years.

“When you look at the new jobs that we’ve created over the last two or three years, as an economist from Colorado State pointed out, they’re almost all minimum wage and part-time jobs and it’s obvious with Georgia’s wonderful assets…that our structure is wrong.”  

Deal countered that “any job is better than no job.”

“Ours has been one of those states that traditionally has never had the same average income as the national average. We’ve always been a state that’s generally been below that, but we’re bringing in good jobs: white collar jobs, we’re bringing in blue collar jobs.”

Meanwhile, Pennnigton says Deal has failed to achieve major tax reform. He says lowering the state income tax by 20 percent will help small businesses grow.

“When you have the tenth highest personal income tax rate in America, that’s very very onerous,” said Pennington.

Deal, however, says dramatically cutting taxes as the state is recovering from the recession is dangerous without understanding the implications.

 “We are ranked as being at the very bottom in terms of the tax burden on our citizens so it’s pretty hard to get better than that on taxes so I look forward to running on my record.”

Deal did say he supports moving to a more consumption based tax system at some point, but says it must be done carefully.