The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Abrams' rise begins a delicate balancing act for Democrats
Aside from a few key congressional contests, the Democratic ticket for November
has largely been set. Stacey Abrams, the party’s first African-American and first female nominee for governor, will be at the top.
Abrams ran an excellent campaign, particularly in the closing weeks. A 76 percent showing on Tuesday has silenced more traditional Georgia Democrats worried that her personal finances and “unapologetic progressive” approach will haunt her in the fall.
Republicans will make sure those worries live on — witness the Republican Governors Association attack on Abrams within minutes of her declaration of victory. But if you’re handicapping the governor’s race by looking at Abrams alone, you’re making a mistake.
On Tuesday, Democratic voters stitched together the most diverse ballot seen in a generation. Abrams, a lawyer/legislator and part-time romance novel writer, will continue her nationalization of the contest
— she’s now earned the right to call most of the shots.
But directly under Abrams is Sarah Riggs Amico, who won the nomination for lieutenant governor and checks an unusual combination of boxes: She’s a white, prochoice, evangelical, first-time
candidate and trucking executive who has made sure that every one of her employees had health insurance.
Then there’s John Barrow, now the nominee for secretary of state. Once upon a time, Barrow was the last white Democrat from the Deep South in Congress. He’s now the ranking white male on the 2018 Democratic ballot — just above Charlie Bailey, the nominee for attorney general. No white male Democrat has been elected to statewide office since Tommy Irvin won re-election as agriculture commissioner in 2006.
The list goes on, and includes two female consumer advocates, Lindy Miller and Dawn Randolph, in two separate races against Republican incumbents on the state Public Service Commission. And there’s Jamaica-born Janice Laws, now the nominee for insurance commissioner.
But Abrams, Amico and Barrow — all running for open seats — are likely to get the most attention and raise the most cash between now and November. “Everybody’s invited. There’s no exclusion in the Democratic party this year,” said Kristin Oblander, who’s in charge of Amico’s fundraising. “This ticket is stronger than the sum of its parts.”
You’d have to go back 20 years, to 1998, to see anything similar. “That’s the last time we had a diverse ticket of this magnitude and significance. And that’s the last time we were really successful,” said Michael Thurmond, CEO of DeKalb County government.
That year, Roy Barnes topped the Democratic ticket as the gubernatorial nominee. Mark Taylor was in the lieutenant governor’s slot. Cathy Cox was the nominee for secretary of state. Thurmond and Thurbert Baker, both African-Americans, were candidates for labor commissioner and attorney general, respectively. Irvin, an important generator of rural Georgia votes, was there, too.
Ideologically, they were all yoked together. “We were all moderate to conservative Democrats,” Thurmond said. That’s not the case this year. “The question is, are they going to run as a ticket?”
Synergy is possible, as is conflict. Regardless of whether Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle or Secretary of State Brian Kemp is at the top of the Republican ticket, the fall campaign is likely to be a harsh, racially charged affair. “Voters are going to judge all candidates on personal conduct and personal finances,” said Tharon Johnson, a Democratic strategist. Amico, Barrow and other members of the biracial Democratic ticket could help mitigate attacks aimed at Abrams.
The other side of the coin is that, even should she fall short in the race for governor, Abrams could draw enough new voters into the process to give Democrats victories down-ballot — which is where Georgia’s last political revolution, the Republican one, began.
In either case, accommodations need to be reached. On Tuesday night, Abrams made clear that she intends no pivot toward an ideological center. Nor is she looking to change her tactic of directing her messages at an African-American base that is often overlooked until the final weeks of a campaign.
“We have to reach out to those who don’t believe their voices matter, who’ve been disappointed again and again by promises made and never kept, who live in places crushed by poverty and neglect, in suburbs isolated from jobs and opportunity,” Abrams said as she claimed victory. “With your help, we will register every last person we know.”
Other Democrats haven’t given up on seeking out white independent and moderate GOP voters. Amico has the potential to reach out to Republican women in suburbia dismayed with President Donald Trump. Barrow forged a congressional career by walking a tightrope stretched between a black urban and white, largely rural electorate.
And some of the hardedged language Abrams employed in the primary to reach black voters might turn off white ones in the general election. Those centrist candidates will be looking for a signal from Abrams that she’s willing to give them the space to make their appeals to the middle.
On Tuesday, Abrams won all but six of Georgia’s 159 counties. Barrow won all but two — Rockdale and Newton. And he did it in a different way, winning pluralities in large metro Atlanta counties, but running up margins of 70 percent and more in east Georgia — where Republicans shifted his congressional district time and again until finally defeating him in 2014.
“East Georgia — that’s going to be the battleground,” said Johnson, the Democratic strategist. “Are we going to be able to pick up areas where John Barrow has showed us — that there are some Democrats there?” And a few Republicans willing to switch.
2018 isn’t 1998. White Democrats dominated the party then, African-Americans are in control now. But it remains a balancing act, and Democrats are likely to spend much of the summer in search of their new center of gravity.
Regardless of whether Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle or Secretary of State Brian Kemp is at the top of the Republican ticket, the fall campaign is likely to be a harsh, racially charged affair.