Kentucky Republicans are fighting over a nominee for governor, with a longtime McConnell ally squaring off against a wealthy former Trump administration ambassador. This churning political mixture has frozen the party and its major supporters in place.
Andy BeshearDaniel Cameron, the attorney general of Kentucky who is vying for the Republican nomination for governor, in Guston, Ky., April 25, 2023.
The unsettled race and escalating hostilities are unwelcome developments for Kentucky Republicans as they search for the strongest nominee to bring down Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat whose party loyalties in a crimson state have not stopped him from becoming one of the nation’s most popular governors. Even Republicans concede that he will be difficult to beat in November, and the contest has quickly become the most closely watched statewide election remaining this year.
Soon after in December, Craft began an aggressive ad campaign, airing a mix of biographical spots to help increase her name recognition and numerous ads attacking Cameron. Commonwealth PAC, a super PAC supporting her candidacy that is partly funded by $1.5 million from her husband, Joe Craft, has aired exclusively negative ads against Cameron, according to AdImpact, a media tracking firm.
His first ad, released Wednesday as part of an initial six-figure purchase, highlights how he “grew up on my family farm in rural Kentucky.” Known in Frankfort for a decade, Quarles has capitalized on long-standing relationships for support. For Republicans, part of the challenge of defeating Beshear has to do with the GOP dominance of the state. Republicans hold supermajorities in the Legislature, making it difficult for the governor to wield much power without a veto. Yet that has kept Beshear from contentious showdowns with Republicans on hot-button issues, and has let him focus on using state resources to help repair infrastructure and improve the economy.
On the issues, Cameron and Craft have little daylight between them. Education is a central tenet, with both pledging to fire the current commissioner of education, and deriding what they call a “woke” agenda in schools. Both embrace nationalized issues such as the southern border despite living in a state nearly 1,000 miles from Mexico.
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