On menu at KY Democratic dinner: a new twist on Trump, taking a bite at GOP supermajority

For a Kentucky Democratic Party led by a second-term Gov. Andy Beshear, Friday night’s “Forward, Together,” party dinner wasn’t just a step forward.

It was a new walk altogether.

At least that was the case when it came to discussing state legislative races and former Republican President Donald Trump.

Seeking re-election in 2023, Beshear did not speak ill of the former president — now the presumed nominee in this year’s race who has claimed 20-plus point wins in Kentucky — unless asked.

At Friday’s dinner, Trump was the first thing he mentioned.

“Folks, I’m grateful to be here tonight, grateful to talk about how we move forward together, and grateful because together last November we beat Donald Trump’s hand-picked candidate for governor,” Beshear told the crowd of roughly 300 attendees.

In referencing the candidate, his gubernatorial opponent former attorney general Daniel Cameron, Beshear also mentioned Cameron’s ties to Kentucky’s U.S. Senators, Mitch McConnell and Rand Paul, pointing out his win in Paul’s home of Warren County.

Beshear’s father, former governor Steve Beshear, also made his own Trump remarks.

“For the very first time the other day I shouted ‘hallelujah’ 34 straight times,” the elder Beshear said in a dig at the 34 counts of falsifying business records on which Trump was recently found guilty.

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Bookending the anti-Trump vibe was former Alabama Democratic U.S. senator Doug Jones.

Jones, a former U.S. district attorney, struck a particularly prosecutorial note against Trump, grilling him for his attempts to subvert the 2020 election.

The topic fit the timing of the dinner. The party was meeting on the eve of its state convention for the first time in eight years since the 2016 presidential election cycle, as the 2020 dinner was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Much of the crowd chatter centered around Saturday’s convention and who would get to serve as a delegate to the Democratic National Convention, where Democratic President Joe Biden is expected to gain the party’s nomination, in Chicago later this Summer.

While no pundit or politician is predicting that Biden will beat Trump in Kentucky, some Democrats are hopeful that suburban distaste for Trump may help flip a handful of seats in Louisville, Lexington and Northern Kentucky.

That was another prevailing theme from the state’s top Democrats: predictions that the top of the ticket will work in tandem with state legislative gains.

That would be new. Democrats have become accustomed to diminished relevance in the state House and Senate since 2016, when the House became the last legislative chamber in the American South to flip from blue to red.

In 2023, the focus was almost solely on Andy Beshear’s re-election tilt, and while many understood the strategy it didn’t please every corner of the party. There was some self-congratulation Friday night — “by five points” the governor jokingly interjected from the crowd as party chair Colmon Elridge celebrated the win — but the most frequently discussed elections were those for the state legislature.

“We are going to pick up seats in our state legislature this November,” Beshear insisted.

Republicans hold four-fifths majorities in both chambers. Democrats claim only 20 House members in the 100-person chamber and seven Senators in that 38-person chamber.

A lot of that has to do with the amendment on the ballot in November asking voters allow the state to provide public dollars for nonpublic and charter schools is one way, many speakers posited.

No Democratic lawmakers voted for the GOP-backed House Bill 2 in this year’s General Assembly.

For them, it’s not a matter of if the amendment will fail, but how badly.

Gov. Beshear: “We’re going to resoundingly beat constitutional Amendment No. 2 and protect public education.”

Former governor Beshear: “We’re gonna blow that thing off the map.”

Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman:”I keep telling (Beshear) ‘I want to crush it,’ and he says, ‘Would you be okay if we just beat it?’ No, I want to crush it.”

Such a predicted result could parlay into some legislative successes, they said.

“It’s also important that we make the people who voted for that amendment pay,” Coleman added. “We’d like to make sure we hold accountable the folks who don’t support public education and send more people to Frankfort who do.

“You better believe that just as hard as we have worked to build this economy, to fight for public education, we will be out there helping these candidates every step of the way.

“Because we’ve got to have some help in Frankfort.”

That enthusiasm spilled over into the crowd.

Former Lexington Democratic Senate candidate Chuck Eddy, who before switching parties led “Republicans for Beshear” in the governor’s first gubernatorial push, left the dinner hopeful.

Eddy guessed that Democrats in the House could pick up three to five total seats. He’s convinced that Beshear and Coleman, unburdened by their own elections, are going to do more for candidates in the state

“I feel that they’re very much going to devote their time,” Eddy said. “I think they’re gonna get out there more.”

What about the issues?

In general, Beshear waxed more progressive than he has in years past. He stressed that his win “showed the country” that Democrats who stand strongly against Republicans on hot-button issues like abortion rights; diversity, equity and inclusion programs; and LGBTQ rights can win.

“Yes, we focus on those things people worry about every single morning, but think about this: we reelected a governor and a lieutenant governor that stood and said women’s reproductive rights and freedoms are critical, we reelected a governor and lieutenant governor that have proudly stood with our LGBTQ+ community (and) we won that election proudly standing up for DEI programs.”

Also of note: both Beshears touted Court of Appeals Justice Pamela Goodwine’s run for the Kentucky Supreme Court, in a move tying the Democratic party closer to Goodwine, who is running in a contested race to replace outgoing Chief Justice Laurance VanMeter for the Central Kentucky-based 5th Kentucky Supreme Court District seat.

Goodwine was among the first candidates that Gov. Beshear’s political action committee endorsed.

Republican embrace of a supreme court candidate, and vice versa, two years ago raised alarm among Democrats and the Kentucky Judicial Campaign Conduct Committee.

Beshear put emphasis on the historic nature of her candidacy, predicting to major cheers that Kentuckians would “elect the first black woman as a Supreme Court justice in our history.”