In the Kentucky Governor’s race, there’s a clear and compelling choice | Opinion

It would be difficult to find a first-term governor who has weathered as much as Andy Beshear.

Three months after his 2019 election, Kentucky and the rest of the country were hit with a terrifying and devastating pandemic. Then in December 2021, tornadoes leveled a swath of Western Kentucky, wiping both Mayfield and Beshear’s father’s hometown of Dawson Springs, right off the map. Fifty-seven people were killed.

A year later, unprecedented rains in Eastern Kentucky sent walls of water through homes and businesses, killing 45 and upturning already vulnerable communities. In April of this year, a mass shooter at the Old National Bank in Louisville murdered five people, including one of Beshear’s friends and mentors, Tommy Elliott.

Beshear had to call Elliott’s wife to deliver the news.

Through it all, Beshear has been a stalwart, steady presence in the lives of Kentuckians, comforting people with big hugs and even bigger policies to get people back on their feet. On this leadership alone, he would earn our endorsement. But additionally, he is the clear and compelling choice because he has been a bulwark against extremism in the state while putting it on stronger footing in a host of other ways for the future.

He more than deserves a second term and earns the Herald-Leader’s endorsement for governor.

After months of requests, Daniel Cameron’s campaign team finally declined to meet with our editorial board this week. That automatically disqualifies him from an endorsement, but it would also be hard to convince us that he can rise above his extremist rhetoric aimed at the furthest right-wing portions of the state, rather than the whole.

The Republican attorney general is a charismatic speaker, and we applaud his work on important matters, such as the bipartisan lawsuit against Meta for hooking children on social media. But his flip-flopping campaign has proved he is not a serious candidate in either perspective or policy. His back and forth on abortion exceptions, his decision to threaten corporations on diverse hiring, his advocacy of policies to punish women who leave the state for abortion care, his tardy and insincere pleas to teachers, his constant railing on LGBTQ issues all show he is more interested in power than in ideas and policies that can move Kentucky forward.

His fawning devotion to a former Republican president now facing 91 separate criminal counts in four states further shows just how unsuited to the job he would be.

COVID Culture

Today, it’s easy to pretend that we always knew COVID-19 would morph into an annual flu that only occasionally turns into something more serious; more accurate memories would recall the fear and panic that faced this nation as we grappled with the first pandemic since 1918.

Amid the mixed messages from the Center for Disease Control and failed leadership from the White House, without vaccines or medications, Beshear became a calm and informative presence. Every day at 4 p.m., he appeared on TV and computer screens to give us the latest updates on COVID, honor the dead and issue clear and cogent directions based on the best thinking at the time.

Beshear saved lives with the precautions. Did he make mistakes? Of course. Were children out of school for too long? Yes. But as reporter Sarah Ladd points out in a retrospective on Kentucky and COVID in the Kentucky Lantern, Kentucky is considered the third most unhealthy state in the nation and yet Kentucky’s death rate was lower than both Tennessee and West Virginia. Beshear didn’t get everything right. But he did the best he could with the information he had, pushing back against conspiracy, misinformation and those who would have used the crisis to further their political ends.

New technologies

In the past two years, Kentucky has been hit end to end with natural disasters, whose scope and intensity are clearly fueled by climate change. Beshear moved forward with emergency aid, new housing funds, and new housing developments on former mine lands. And he showed up time and time again.

Most important, however, is Beshear’s acceptance of climate change and future energy policies that include and acknowledge coal’s importance in Kentucky, but also clean energy such as solar and wind.

Part of that new portfolio is Kentucky’s single largest economic development project ever announced: Ford’s twin EV battery plants, a $5.8 billion project that will propel Kentucky into leadership in the electric vehicle market and create more than 5,000 jobs.

Another big announcement appears to be brewing in Madison County. As governors do, Beshear has spent much of his campaign making big jobs announcements all over the state — nearly 900 new and expansion projects that total $27.5 billion in investments, creating 48,000 jobs.

Beshear also brightened Kentucky’s economic outlook with behind-the-scenes work with legislators on both sides of the aisle to bring two of Kentucky’s most difficult issues to fruition: medical marijuana and sports betting. These new revenues — $250 million has been gambled since the law went into effect since Sept. 7 — will eventually support the state’s general fund, which could be in trouble thanks to the GOP plan to end the income tax over time. (In a moment of very funny political gamesmanship, Beshear happily signed this year’s income tax bill to lower it another point even though he knows it is overall a reckless economic plan for Kentucky.)

Moving forward

Beshear won his first term thanks to support from teachers, and has proved an important ally of public education amid continuing attacks. Some of those have been launched by Daniel Cameron, who supports a constitutional amendment that would allow public school money to be diverted to religious and private institutions.

As Beshear told us in an editorial board meeting: “I oppose any school choice that would take dollars and send them to unaccountable private schools.”

He has also put forth a plan for an 11% raise for all school employees, part of a $1.1 billion education plan that would also fully fund transportation and attract more teachers to the field. His expertise is enhanced by Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman, a former teacher and fiery education advocate.

Beshear is also an ally of women and children, and an enemy of efforts to repress them. He supports exceptions for rape, incest and fetal anomalies in Kentucky’s draconian abortion laws. Despite the many lies of his opponent’s campaign ads, Beshear would be in favor of abortion laws that more closely resemble those allowed under Roe v. Wade, or those that follow the science about when a fetus reaches viability outside the womb.

Beshear stands up for what’s right. He vetoed Senate Bill 150, a punitive, cruel bill targeting transgender children in their schools, and one that he correctly understood takes decision making out of parents’ hands about what’s best for their kids. He could have scored cheap political points by signing it, but he refused.

The General Assembly’s supermajority means that Beshear cannot be a complete bulwark against the worst ideas of that body, but he still forms an important line of resistance in the crucial checks and balances that create our democracy. His executive branch personnel provide sane and steady guidance through executive policies such as the Medicaid expansion and with economic development officials who worry about more about jobs than trying to control who a company is hiring.

If he wins a second term, we would encourage Beshear to allow more transparency in his administration, try to work with the General Assembly, and make more and better improvements in troubled systems such juvenile justice and unemployment.

But these are minor points. For Kentucky, the choice is clear and the choice is essential. Beshear has been an unflappable presence throughout some of our most tempestuous history, rising above politics to emphasize the needs of all Kentuckians. He has created a better Kentucky and deserves a second term to continue his work. We think he is without a doubt the strongest candidate in this race and earns our endorsement.

This story was originally published October 26, 2023 at 8:00 AM.