The Kentucky governor race on May 16 is the first important Republican primary in any state since the midterms — and the first test of Donald Trump’s clout in the party after his November face-planting.
It will also influence the course of the most critical general election in 2023.
Ruby-red supporters Kentucky will have to decide whether to keep their popular Democratic governor or to vote for a candidate affiliated with the state’s increasingly dominant party.
Kentucky hasn’t been a competitive state in national politics in a long time: Bill Clinton took it twice in the 1990s, but Republicans have won it by double digits in every election since 2000, including then-President Donald Trump’s 26-point victory in 2020. However, Gov. Andy Beshear’s tight victory in 2019 — and his continued popularity since taking office — suggests that ticket-splitting is still alive and strong.
This month’s primary will only select Beshear’s opponent in November, not his fate as governor. However, the primary highlights major demographic and strategic drivers of state politics, predicting the complexities of the upcoming general election. Here are five important numbers to remember:
twenty-one percent
The race, like the Kentucky Derby, began with a clear favourite: State Attorney General Daniel Cameron, who has Trump’s endorsement, broke fastest out the gate among the 13 candidates for the GOP candidature. However, Kelly Craft, Trump’s former ambassador to Canada and the United Nations, has been launching a late charge.
A Mason-Dixon Polling and Research survey conducted in January placed Cameron comfortably ahead of Craft, 39 percent to 13 percent. There hasn’t been much public polling lately, but an Emerson College/WDKY-TV poll released last month found the race to be much closer, with 21 percent of voters still undecided.
Cameron’s supporters deny that the campaign is over, circulating their own internal survey that shows him still comfortably ahead — but with 19 percent undecided.
Primaries, like horse contests, start late because voters and candidates are largely ideologically oriented. Cameron and Craft, the top two Republican candidates, will be vying for those undecided voters.
7.2 million dollars
Craft will not be unable to capture Cameron on May 16 due to a lack of financial resources.
According to AdImpact, an ad-tracking agency, Craft, the wife of billionaire coal magnate Joe Craft, has already spent or booked $5.8 million in TV advertising. She’s also benefited from $1.4 million in commercials from Commonwealth PAC, an outside group partly (but not fully) sponsored by Joe Craft, albeit those ads are no longer running. That implies she’s already spent at least $7.2 million on the primary.
Cameron, on the other hand, has only spent or booked $564,000. Bluegrass Freedom Action, an outside organisation, has contributed $2.1 million to assist him narrow the gap. The organisation is launching advertisements boasting Trump’s endorsement.
Craft’s spending advantage has proven to be a double-edged sword. Cameron has chastised her for depending on her family’s funds in the primary, but she may also offer Republicans the possibility of a blank cheque to bankroll an expensive and arduous general election campaign against Beshear.
forty-six percent
Last year, Kentucky Republicans overtook Democrats in voter registration for the first time in history, marking a watershed moment in the state’s swift red shift.
Democrats still had a huge registration edge, 49 percent to 42 percent, four years ago. According to the state Board of Elections, Republicans exceed Democrats in registration by 46 percent to 44 percent coming into this primary.
Democrats’ ancestral registration lead has been rapidly eroded. When Republicans nominated Peppy Martin for an ill-fated run against Democratic Gov. Paul Patton twenty-four years ago, Republicans accounted for only 32% of registered voters, outnumbering Democrats (61%) nearly 2-to-1. When Steve Beshear, Beshear’s father, was first elected in 2007, Democrats held a 20-point registration edge, 57 percent to 37 percent.
For the first time this year, more voters will be able to participate in the Republican primary.
63 percent of the time
Despite the state’s tilt to the right, Beshear remains popular.
How well-known are they? Beshear has the highest approval rating of any Democratic governor, at 63 percent, according to Morning Consult’s quarterly tracking. He outperforms governors in blue states such as Massachusetts, Maryland, Hawaii, California, and New York.
Beshear’s strong approval rating isn’t due to Morning Consult’s methodology or extensive field period: In the January Mason-Dixon survey, he had a 61 percent positive job rating.
Republicans have begun the process of undermining Beshear’s popularity. Late last month, an independent group associated with the Republican Governors Association began airing culture-war-tinged TV ads criticising the Democrat for “allowing sex changes for children as young as 8 or 9 years old.”
a total of 72 points
So, how can Beshear put together a winning coalition in a state that has become increasingly Republican?
It involves a large number of Trump supporters who switched sides.
According to an AWN study of election results, Trump outperformed then-Gov. Matt Bevin in each of Kentucky’s 120 counties in 2020. In one rural county, Beshear won by 20, and Biden lost by 51 the following year. As a result, those two races are separated by an unprecedented 72 points.
The disparities were large, although relatively minor, in the bluer population centres: Beshear won Fayette County, home to Lexington, by 33 points in 2019, while President Joe Biden won it by 21 points a year later. Beshear won by 35 points in Louisville, but Biden won by 20.
Outside of the cities, the margin between the two races was widest, particularly in Eastern Kentucky, where Democrats previously ruled but now barely register in presidential campaigns. Consider Elliott County, where Trump defeated Biden by a three-to-one ratio in 2020, 75 percent to 24 percent. Beshear won it over Bevin, and it wasn’t even close: 59 percent to 39 percent.
The same thing is happening in other conservative counties nearby. Beshear won Boyd County, home to Ashland, the main city in Eastern Kentucky’s coal belt, by 6 points in 2019, but Trump won it by 33 points a year later.
Whoever wins the GOP primary this month will surely try to nationalise the contest in order to undermine Beshear’s popularity in these strongly conservative counties — though it’s worth noting that Bevin tried the same strategy in 2019 and lost.
