Could Gov. Andy Beshear’s move to national stage come sooner than expected? | Opinion
Twice in the last 50 years, a moderate Southern Democratic governor relatively obscure outside his native state has been elected president. It happened to Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Bill Clinton in 1992. Prior to June 27, it seemed as if Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear was on a clear path toward a 2028 presidential candidacy, and he still may be, but events have moved swiftly in the days since, leaving American politics in uncharted waters with just over four months until Election Day.
In politics, as in life, circumstances can change quickly. Despite some wobbly performances in the past and concerns about his age, virtually no one was ready for the President Joe Biden who showed up to the first 2024 debate. It was a debacle the likes of which no candidate has ever faced since televised presidential debates began in 1960. Richard Nixon’s five-o-clock shadow and perspiration, and the missteps of other past candidates were minor hindrances compared to what Americans saw out of Biden on that stage in Atlanta.
Only the most bitter partisan could not feel some degree of sympathy for the 81-year-old president, who was first elected as a U.S. senator from Delaware at age 29 in 1972. Biden seemed at times disoriented, and at some points, could not cogently communicate his thoughts. Almost immediately, alarm bells began ringing within the highest echelons of the Democratic Party, and they have not been silenced, despite efforts from Biden’s inner circle to reassure voters of the president’s vitality.
In “The Year That Broke Politics: Collusion and Chaos in the Presidential Election of 1968,” author Luke A. Nichter details President Lyndon B. Johnson’s decision to drop his re-election bid. It’s a book that top Biden aides should place at the top of their reading lists, and soon.
“[Johnson] understood how the presidency had drained the health of Democratic heroes Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt...while he felt he could run again and win, he worried he would be unable to finish his second term,” Nichter writes.
If Biden bows out, it is anybody’s guess who would replace him as the Democratic nominee. Beshear’s name is being mentioned alongside other governors such as California’s Gavin Newsome, Illinois’s J.B. Pritzker, Maryland’s Wes Moore, Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer, and Pennsylvania’s Josh Shapiro. The early line, however, is that Vice President Kamala Harris would have the edge over the rest of the field despite her less-than-stellar hypothetical polling numbers. If Harris suddenly found herself in the top slot, Beshear would provide an optimal balance to the Democratic ticket as the vice-presidential nominee.
Beshear has not taken positions that are unorthodox from the national Democratic mainstream such as those held by West Virginia U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin and others, which is a positive for any national ambitions he harbors. The last time a Kentucky governor was in the mix nationally, in 1984, many speculated that then-Gov. Martha Layne Collins was passed over for a vice-presidential nomination due to her pro-life position – a problem that will not hinder Beshear. But he still hails from a medium-sized state that is not known for producing progressives, and in tone and tenor, Beshear is not a screeching liberal in an age when bombast and theatrics are very much in vogue.
Still, after the back-to-back presidencies of Trump and Biden, Americans just might be finally ready to give more than a passing glance to a candidate of a younger generation who maintains legitimate crossover appeal (perhaps in 2024, more likely in 2028). Democrats would be wise to consider this test of electability in a general election as paramount in their decision making. Indeed, Beshear was the subject of a fawning piece last month in the Wall Street Journal entitled “This Democratic Governor Knows How to Win in a Red State. Is His Party Listening?”
Ironically, legendary top Democratic strategist James Carville, who helped Wallace Wilkinson derail Beshear’s father Gov. Steve Beshear’s career for 20 years in the 1987 Kentucky Democratic gubernatorial primary, has recently touted Andy as one of the Democrats’ top national stars.
Given the current political landscape in Kentucky, it cannot be discounted that regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees with him on any number of positions (and as a Republican, I do not always agree with Gov. Beshear on a variety of issues), the governor is a talented politician full of energy, discipline, and focus who has won three consecutive statewide races against vast headwinds.
Is Andy ready to go national? I’d bet on it. The question now is when.
T. J. Litafik is principal of Solon Strategies, LLC, a Lexington-based political strategy and government affairs firm.
