Trail to ’23: KY general election kicks off, Beshear hits the road, Cameron’s new poll

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 six 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. Earlier editions from the primaries can be found online.

If you thought there’d be a breather between the end of the Kentucky primary season and the beginning of the general election campaign push, you thought wrong.

Gov. Andy Beshear, the incumbent Democrat, came out swinging last week with the first TV ad of the general election season, quickly followed by a three-day, 12-city bus tour across the commonwealth.

Attorney General Daniel Cameron, the Republican nominee, emerged triumphant from a 12-way primary with 48% of the vote. While he’s not yet airing commercials, Cameron is still on TV, thanks to an appearance on Fox News.

“The Democrats are worried about you, clearly,” host Laura Ingraham says to Cameron. “Now, why do you think that is, considering the Beshear family is such an entrenched political, kind of mini-dynasty in the state and still quite popular.”

“The Beshear Family and Andy Beshear are afraid because we have built a lot of momentum out of the election that occurred yesterday,” Cameron said. I’m excited about prosecuting the case against Andy Beshear. He shut down our churches. He shut down our schools.”

Ingraham noted that Beshear spent part of his victory night speech “bashing” the Republican primary. Beshear said commercials from the heated, expensive primary were “a steady, dangerous drumbeat of fear and division, running Kentucky down, attacking our educators, our healthcare heroes, anyone that they can make the boogeyman that month.”

“Division. Who’s stroking division between the races, among ethnicities, these days given what’s happened to our cities, our localities, with crime and economic deprivation. Who’s dividing?” Ingraham asked.

“Laura, it’s obviously the Democrats and Andy Beshear has been leading that charge,” Cameron said.

Ingraham also asked Cameron why Black liberals were “quite nervous” about him.

“I’m breaking up that old regime. I’ve told people time and time again that I think for myself,” Cameron said. “There are a lot of Black folks out there that want to be conservative, want to be Republican, and I’m trying to lead that effort here in Kentucky and lead everybody.”

Cameron also appeared in a segment with Fox News host Neil Cavuto.

Beshear rakes in the cash

According to Beshear’s campaign manager, Eric Hyers, their campaign raised more than $650,000 in the first 24 hours following the primary election. Hyer said it was the “best general election kickoff to a Gov re-elect I have ever seen.”

That tidbit of news prompted a campaign email from Cameron’s camp declaring “we’re being MASSIVELY outraised by the Radical Left machine” running Beshear’s campaign.

The email also called Beshear a “radical left Democrat” and a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

We’ll have to wait and see the next batch of Kentucky Registry of Election Finance reports to find out more about the candidates’ cash.

Cameron’s internal poll

On Sunday night, Cameron’s team shared what it described as the “first post-general election poll” of the Kentucky governor’s race. The internal poll — meaning it was paid for by a campaign — was conducted by co/efficient, which has a B+ grade from FiveThirtyEight.

In addition to all the caveats that come from internal polling, another note: the Cameron campaign did not release any raw data or cross-tabs to go along with this poll, so no one can dig into the findings beyond what the campaign released. So, with that in mind, let’s look at the findings.

According to the Cameron campaign, the poll was conducted May 18-19, included 987 likely general election voters and has a margin of error of about 3%.

The highlights, as released by the Cameron campaign:

• If the general election were held today, Beshear would beat Cameron 45-43%, with 12% of voters remaining undecided.

• Of the respondents, 47% have a favorable view of Beshear, 42% unfavorable and 10% are undecided. The information released did not provide any information on Cameron’s favorability.

• In regional breakdowns, Beshear carries Louisville (52%-41% with 7% undecided) and Lexington (47%-39% with 14% undecided). Cameron leads in the Northern Kentucky area, identified in the poll as “Cincinatti” (47%-40% with 13% undecided) and western, eastern and south central Kentucky, lumped together by the poll as “other” (48%-37% with 15% undecided).

Republicans were buoyed by the news, with the state party releasing a statement calling Beshear “vulnerable” and saying Cameron is “starting off in a strong position.”

Democrats, however, had a different read on it.

“Team Cameron’s response to their embarrassing start to the general election is to put out a trash poll…..that shows him losing,” Hyers tweeted.

Debates this fall? We’ll see!

With more than a half-dozen debates in the GOP gubernatorial primary, will we see similar action in the Beshear-Cameron general?

Well, it’s too soon to say. But Beshear has signaled his willingness to get on stage.

Asked about the possibility of debating Cameron at a recent news conference, here’s what Beshear had to say:

“I’ll just say that it’s important for candidates for governor to be willing and have the courage to not only debate, but stand in front of the press and take questions. Now, these jobs, it used to be one of the just requirements or expectations, that you be willing to answer questions, that you wouldn’t try to dodge them. And lately we have seen more and more and more officials not do what I do here. Not hold a regular press conference, maybe not hold one at all, and then refuse to take questions. I think it’s important when we think about trust. You think about honesty, to have someone who’s willing to take those hard questions, and I’m certainly going to continue to do it.”

Cameron participated in several of the primary season’s debates, including KET, Fox 56 and Spectrum News, but skipped Kentucky Sports Radio, WKYT and the NKY Republican debates.