Daniel Cameron tests the appeal of Black Republican candidates

Kentucky Republican primary voters must decide on Tuesday if GOP-star-in-waiting, Daniel Cameron, will be the one to take on Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat who consistently ranks among the most popular governors in the nation, despite leading a state Trump won by  roughly 26 points in 2020. He's running in a crowded field, but is the favorite to win the Republican nomination.

Cameron is Kentucky’s first Black attorney general and the first Republican to occupy the post in seven decades. He enjoys widespread name ID across the state and nationally. A former defensive back with the University of Louisville football team, he's part of a string of recent success the GOP has enjoyed in recent cycles electing Black candidates to federal and statewide office, including Reps. Byron Donalds of Florida, John James of Michigan and Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson who is seeking the GOP gubernatorial nomination for governor in North Carolina next year.

While Cameron has rarely leaned into the historic nature of his gubernatorial run, his jockeying for the state’s top office provides an early look at how well a Black Republican can do with the majority white primary voters that make up the GOP’s base.

Kentucky, along with Louisiana, represents one of the GOP’s two best chances to flip a governorship in this off-year election cycle. If successful, it will provide a blueprint for other conservative candidates running in deep-red states where Democratic incumbents are up for reelection. It will also test the strength of whether former President Donald Trump has regained his touch as kingmaker after having several high profile misses during last year’s midterms.

Cameron’s chief rival for the gubernatorial nomination is Kelly Craft, who served as his ambassador to the United Nations during the latter part of the Trump administration.

There’s little daylight on policy between Cameron and Craft. The two leading GOP candidates have sparred over education and pitching themselves as leading the resistance to what they warn is the indoctrination of children in schools. This was highlighted in one ad from Craft warning against “woke bureaucrats parachuting in to hijack our children’s future.” (She received a last-minute endorsement from Florida Gov. and likely Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis.)

Cameron leaned into this too, including in a Twitter thread in March where he said: “‘Woke’ is deeply un-American and it's being taught to our kids every day in our schools as gospel.”

There’s scant public polling in the race, but of the handful of ones available, Cameron never trailed. In the final Emerson College Poll survey of GOP primary voters in the state, Cameron the presumptive frontrunner, regained his command in the race with 33 percent support. Craft notched just 18 percent — despite her dropping tremendous sums in the primary: more than $6.5 million, compared to just over a million for Cameron, according to an analysis of Ad Impact.

“It looks, in our data, that Cameron's numbers improved, particularly amongst older voters,” Spencer Kimball, executive director of Emerson College Polling, tells POLITICO. He noted that while Craft’s had a six point drop in between the April and May surveys, Cameron himself only saw a rise by three percentage points.

“A fair assessment, at this point, is that Cameron has a bit of a ceiling, at least in our numbers,” Kimball says.

That potential ceiling is worrisome to Tres Watson, a Republican Strategist in Lexington who a worked on a previous campaign for a candidate who trails both Craft and Cameron in recent polling. Watson is not working on a gubernatorial campaign, but he is hearing similar sentiments from folks throughout the state and there is anxiety brewing, particularly as GOP voters begin to turn their attention to the general election.

“I think there's a lot of trepidation,” Watson says. “I think a lot of people were outwardly [saying they’re excited], but I think when you talk to people behind closed doors, I think there's a lot of concern.”

For some conservatives, Cameron is a promise of the party’s future: someone who possesses the rare pedigree of being a protégé of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell while also securing the coveted endorsement of former President Donald Trump.

Trump's not wavering in his support for Cameron. In an effort to shore up his base, the Kentucky attorney general, who spoke during a primetime address at the Republican National Convention in 2020, introduced Trump during a Mother's Day tele-rally with supporters.

“One of the folks who has been intimately focused on making sure that I get across the finish line…has been my good friend President Donald J. Trump,” Cameron said on the call.

“Everybody needs to get out and vote for Daniel Cameron to be your next governor,” Trump added moments later, before disparaging Beshear as being too radical for Kentucky and pointing to the more than 20 times Cameron filed lawsuits against both Beshear and the Biden administration in his three years as AG.

Cameron elicits scorn from liberals, primarily for failing to bring charges against the white Louisville police officers who shot and killed Breonna Taylor, a Black EMT, during a botched raid of her apartment in March of 2020. Her killing, along with that of George Floyd, Rayshard Brooks and others, became rallying cries during the height of the racial justice protests three years ago. The Justice Department last summer brought federal charges against the four former and current officers involved in Taylor’s death, alleging her civil rights were violated and officers engaged in use of excessive force.

Prominent figures like pop singer Rihanna, NBA icon LeBron James and actress Kerry Washington are among the celebrities who express anger over the Taylor incident and directed their ire towards Cameron, but none have publicly stated they’d campaign for Beshear.

Watson, the Republican strategist, says he expects the Democratic Governors Association to empty its coffers to protect Beshear and if Cameron does get the nomination, wealthy liberal celebrities, still angered over Cameron’s handling of the Breonna Taylor case, may begin flooding the Democratic governor with donations.

“This is the ballgame,” Watson says. “Especially if Cameron's the nominee, and you got like LeBron and Rihanna raising money for [Beshear]...what's the pain threshold for the RGA to really heavily engage here and compete on equal footing?”

Officials with the Republican Governors Association said they were not concerned about outside celebrity influence playing a factor in the general election. They add that Beshear, who only narrowly swept into office four years ago, defeated the wildly unpopular incumbent Matt Bevin (R) by roughly 5,000 votes. Republican officials also point out that Cameron received more than 122,000 more votes than Beshear that year, according to results from the Kentucky State Board of Elections.

Bob Babbage, a longtime Democratic strategist in the state, says Kentucky’s off-year election will provide insights and strategies for how other red-state incumbent Democrats who are up for reelection in 2024 can perform.

"Kentucky steals the show in the fall and is a predictor or harbinger for the future [elections],” Babbage says, adding this year will be no different.

CLARIFICATION: This article has been updated to clarify Tres Watson's affiliation.