Kentucky Attorney General Andy Beshear (D) on Monday said he would run for governor in 2019, alongside an assistant principal who helped lead protests at the state capital over a pension overhaul measure earlier this year.
Beshear, who has clashed frequently with Gov. Matt Bevin (R), had long been expected to mount a gubernatorial campaign. He is the son of Bevin’s predecessor, two-term Gov. Steve Beshear (D).
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His running mate, Jacqueline Coleman, also comes from a political family. Her father served in the state legislature for more than a decade. She lost a bid to serve the same district in 2014.
The Democratic ticket highlights teacher protests that ground Frankfort to a halt earlier this year, after Republicans pushed through a pension overhaul that would have cut benefits for teachers and some other public workers.
After the Kentucky uprising, teachers in West Virginia, Oklahoma and Arizona took to the streets to protest low wages and skimpy benefits.
“We’re running because Frankfort is broken,” Beshear said in a video announcing his campaign. “Governors have a moral responsibility to provide jobs, opportunity, and justice for everyone.”
Bevin has not said whether he will seek reelection in 2019. He won office in 2015 over then-Attorney General Jack Conway (D) by a 53 percent to 44 percent margin, even as most observers cast Bevin as the underdog.
Beshear and Bevin have been at each other’s throats almost since the moment they took office. The two have sued each other a total of eight times, over several of Bevin’s legislative priorities, and even over the scope of the attorney general’s office.
Republicans in Kentucky cast Beshear as an extension of an old way of playing politics.
“I’m glad Andy Beshear has announced his candidacy so early,” state Republican Party spokesman Tres Watson said in an email. “It will allow us to remind Kentuckians voting both this fall and next of the sort of corrupt, pay-to-play, scandal ridden government they can expect if Democrats are returned to power in Frankfort.”
Kentucky has trended red in recent years, along with much of the rest of the South; before Republicans recaptured the state House in 2016, it was the last Southern legislative chamber still controlled by Democrats.
Bevin would be the first Republican governor in the state to win election to two terms if he wins in 2019. Kentucky has only allowed governors to serve two consecutive terms since 1992, and two governors — Democrats Paul Patton and Steve Beshear — have won consecutive elections.
Kentucky is one of three states, along with Louisiana and Mississippi, that holds gubernatorial elections the year before a presidential election.