A flurry of new pro-Beshear ads, plus Cameron on the Trump indictment | Trail to ’23

This is part of an occasional Herald-Leader series, Trail to ‘23, to catch readers up on all the latest from this year’s Kentucky elections, most notably the governor’s race. There are fewer than five months until the November 7 general election in which Kentuckians will decide the commonwealth’s next governor: incumbent Democrat Andy Beshear or Republican challenger Daniel Cameron.

Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and a group backing him for re-election are continuing to release ads at a furious pace.

Six new videos bolstering Beshear or blitzing GOP nominee Daniel Cameron were published last week alone.

The Beshear campaign dropped two new ads last Tuesday. The first, “Kathy,” features Kathy O’Nan, the mayor of Mayfield, a small Western Kentucky town devastated by the December 2021 tornadoes.

“And the night that the tornado hit and since then, I have been in constant contact with Gov. Beshear,” O’Nan says in the video. “The governor has assured us that we will have everything we need to get through this. I remember the comfort that we all gained from his strength during that time.”

The second ad, “Booming,” touts the Democratic governor’s record on economic development.

Additionally, Defending Bluegrass Values, a group backed by the Democratic Governors Association, released three new digital ads and a new TV ad, all centering around Cameron’s response to the controversial pardons issued by former governor Matt Bevin as he left office in 2019.

“Not only has Daniel Cameron refused to do anything for three and a half years after promising to look into the pardon scandal while rapists and murderers who terrorized Kentuckians have walked free, he actually hired the same Bevin attorneys who recommended the pardons to senior roles in his own office,” said DGA States Press Secretary Emma O’Brien.

Cameron has previously responded to allegations that he failed to investigate the pardons by pointing out that he referred the matter to the FBI at the time, a move which drew bipartisan praise from then-state senate minority leader Morgan McGarvey, now a U.S. representative.

Medium Buying reports that TV and radio ad spending in the Kentucky governor’s race has now topped $3 million, the vast majority of which is backing Beshear.

While Cameron has yet to release his first television ad of the general election campaign, he is continuing to hit the campaign trail with a stop in Northern Kentucky last Friday and a visit to Shepherdsville this Tuesday.

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Cameron responds to Trump indictment

Former president Donald Trump has become the first ex-president to face federal criminal charges. A grand jury has indicted Trump for mishandling documents after leaving the White House and conspiring to block the investigation into his conduct surrounding those documents.

Because Trump has endorsed Cameron’s bid for Kentucky governor, the Herald-Leader reached out to Cameron’s campaign for reaction to the indictment.

The Attorney General responded by saying Kentuckians are worried about the “political weaponization of government power.”

“Somehow, Donald Trump appears to always be treated differently than the Democrats,” Cameron said in a statement. “Joe Biden has mishandled classified information and so did Hillary Clinton. Where are those indictments? It appears there are two systems of justice: one for Republicans and one for Democrats.”

Cameron’s campaign did not respond to a Herald-Leader follow-up inquiry asking if Cameron had any concerns about the seriousness of the allegations against Trump or if the development changed his support for the former president at all.

No third-party candidate on the ballot

Cameron and Beshear will be the only two candidates for governor on the ballot come November.

That was not the case in 2019, when Libertarian John Hicks was also an option printed on the ballot. He received more than 28,000 votes.

That matters because Beshear narrowly beat Republican incumbent Bevin — little more than 5,000 votes separated the two candidates. Had Hicks not won over 2% of the electorate, the 2019 race could have had a very different outcome.

With Beshear-Cameron anticipated to be a tight contest, every vote will matter.

Voter registration numbers trend to the right

Republicans like what they see when it comes to Kentucky’s voter registration trends.

The latest numbers released by the Secretary of State’s office show the GOP growing in numbers while Democrats are losing voters.

Republicans are just shy of 46% of all registered voters in Kentucky, while Democrats top out at a hair over 44%. Voters in the “other” category are a full 10% of the electorate.

When Beshear was elected in 2019, Democrats still made up the largest share of Kentucky voters, though the commonwealth had begun trending red well before then. Registration officially tipped in the GOP’s favor in June 2022.

Cameron to defend anti-trans bill in court

The premier piece of legislation from the 2023 General Assembly — Senate Bill 150, which bans gender-affirming care for trans youth among other restrictions — is being challenged in court by the American Civil Liberties Union. As the larger suit unfolds, the ACLU has asked a judge to temporarily block the law from being enforced.

As attorney general, Cameron has vowed to defend the law and on Friday announced his office had filed a brief opposing the ACLU’s request.

“The fringe perception that harmful drugs and life-altering mutilations should be used to affirm a child’s gender is monstrous,” Cameron said in a statement. “My office is proud to be the voice of sanity and Kentucky’s bulwark against woke gender ideology.”