Editor’s Note: This interview first appeared in Path Finders, an email newsletter from the Daily Yonder. Each week, Path Finders features a Q&A with a rural thinker, creator, or doer. Like what you see here? You can join the mailing list at the bottom of this article and receive more conversations like this in your inbox each week.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear’s first term was, in many ways, a whirlwind. Shortly after taking office in 2019, Covid-19 began to spread across Kentucky. In 2021, tornadoes in the state’s western counties tore through communities and killed dozens. The next summer, flooding in eastern Kentucky killed more than 40 people and displaced thousands.
On paper, Beshear’s prospects for reelection in 2023 might have appeared bleak given these compounding tragedies. The Democrat’s share of the rural vote in Kentucky, though, increased, helping him win by five points in a state Donald Trump won by over 25 points in 2020. His gains were particularly strong in rural Appalachian counties affected by the 2022 flooding.
What was it that led to Beshear’s impressive performance among rural voters? What can presidential tickets learn from his governing and campaign style in rural communities? And what, in such a seemingly negative political climate, should we be optimistic about? In this interview, Beshear gives his thoughts.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
-Will Wright
Will Wright, The Daily Yonder: From 2019 to 2023, you increased your share of votes in rural counties from 40.9% to 43.3%. To give a comparison, the Democratic presidential candidates got 33% of rural votes in 2016 and 34% in 2020, according to a Daily Yonder analysis. So there’s a pretty stark comparison there. And I know that running for governor is very different from running for president, but I’m curious if you could reflect on what made you so effective in rural counties in Kentucky. What is it about the way you’ve acted as governor or the way you campaigned that’s worked?
Andy Beshear: Well, I think it’s a couple of things. First, it’s about both running and governing where people wake up every morning. Most people don’t wake up every morning thinking about the next presidential race or the polls or the issue of the day in Washington, D.C. They wake up thinking about their job and whether they make enough to support their family. They wake up and they think about their next doctor’s appointment for themselves or their parents or their kids. And, in rural Kentucky especially, how far they’re going to have to travel to get there. They think about the roads and bridges in their community as they head to work. They think about the public school they’re dropping their kids off at. Then they think about public safety in their communities.
And it’s talking to people and not at them. When Donald Trump is saying, “You’re all getting cheated,” he’s not being honest, but he is talking to them, sounding like he is on an individual’s side. And when people say, “Why do people vote against their own interests?” Well, that’s calling us dumb. And none of us like that. And so it’s important that you govern where people’s worries are. You show up and you show people that you care.
DY: I wanted to ask about showing up. In your first term, if you look at the timeline of events, you have Covid right off the bat. You have devastating tornadoes in western Kentucky. And then the following year in 2022, you have flooding in eastern Kentucky that displaces thousands of people and kills more than 40 people. If you looked at those events on paper, I could see where a candidate would not end up in the state that you did — where you actually increased your share of the vote in some of those rural counties that were hit hardest. Can you tell me about showing up and what you learn from the people in those places when you’re on the ground?
AB: We have been hit pretty hard in Kentucky. The death toll for Covid was unimaginable and impacted everyone. And then we lost 81 people to a tornado. That just doesn’t happen. And then 45 to flooding with, again, entire areas wiped out — folks that didn’t have that much to start with losing everything in one night.
There’s a lot of pain in all of those disasters and events. And as governor, it’s important that you were there the next day, that you’re in those communities and that you listen to that pain, that you provide a little bit of hope, that you show people that you care about them, and then that you make that most important promise: that you’re going to do everything you can to help those individuals. I have been working the last three years to make sure, especially in the west and the east, that we can rebuild. And it’s not just showing up on those most difficult days. It’s the next day and the next week and the next month.
It went from, first, trying to get the debris, the destruction, cleaned up. Then to financing new homes and rebuilding the infrastructure. Now I get to hand out keys to families where I get to see little kids run and pick out their room. These are families that have been living with relatives for two plus years. I mean, I think my standing improved because people saw how much I care and that I really meant it. And that I was going to keep coming back, not just once. It’s not a tour to see destruction. It’s about being there and making the commitment and then coming back and back and back. And I’ll admit to you, I keep doing it whether those regions voted for me or not. It’s the right thing to do. It’s your job as governor. And for me, it’s my faith. It’s what tells me that you’re supposed to be there for people in their darkest moments. They are your neighbors. And our job is to love them, care about them, and help get them back on their feet.
DY: I heard an interview with your campaign manager Eric Hyers on the Pro Politics podcast, and the impression I got from him is that you come at this job with a real belief that government can do good for people. It seems to me like there’s so much negativity around politics and people’s perception of government these days. Do you get that sense when you’re out there, or do you feel that people also think that there is reason to be optimistic about the role of government, especially in times of crisis?
AB: While there is this pessimism hanging over our country, there is a real sense of optimism in Kentucky. We’re seeing jobs locate all across Kentucky, oftentimes more in rural than in urban Kentucky. So it is really exciting what’s going on in our state, and people see it, and it takes work. And it takes hard work.
People would say — and there’s some truth in it — that government doesn’t create jobs. Maybe not. But we provide the incentives to get the company to come. We oftentimes work with the utilities to ensure that there’s the right power load. We run the water and the sewer systems to the sites. We actually have a whole program that gets that next site for a business ready and then the next one, and then the next one after that.
At the same time, the Broadband, Equity, Access and Deployment (BEAD) Program is going to help us run internet to every home. We’re bringing clean drinking water to places that have never had it before. We’re building the first hospital in the largest African-American community in Kentucky, the first hospital in 150 years. And yes, we have a role, and government has had a role in all of these.
I only got into this because I saw my dad (former Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear) and I saw when he expanded Medicaid and 500,000 Kentuckians got coverage for the very first time that otherwise would not have been able to get healthcare. You can do important things in this job and that’s why I never take it for granted. Every day is an opportunity to help more people and, you know, my faith tells me, “To whom much is given much is expected.” When people have put their faith in you and elected you as their governor, you’ve got to bring it every day and find that next program that can lift people up.
DY: I wanted to ask about the state of rural places, nationally. With Tim Walz selected as [Democratic candidate for] VP, I feel like I’ve seen the word “rural” in places like The New York Times, The Washington Post and these major outlets more than I have in a long time. Considering your performance in rural counties in Kentucky, I’m curious if you think there is a shift toward thinking about rural places in more nuanced ways, or paying attention to them more on the national scene. And if there is, do you have any advice for candidates now and in the future about how to gain trust in rural areas, how to connect with people and eventually get votes in rural communities?
AB: Let me first say that Tim Walz is a great friend, a great governor, and he’s going to be an amazing vice president of the United States. Even though I was in that [conversation], Tim is a great choice. I think it’s such a good thing that we are talking about rural America because those are my people. And for so many of us, it’s critical that we have both parties communicating, and government focused on rural America because I can tell you that’s where the jobs are coming right now. When a business is looking where to set up, they’re looking at where they can draw from multiple counties and where there is potentially less competition. For the first time in my lifetime jobs are going to people instead of expecting people to move to those jobs. So investment in rural America right now can also have a really significant return.
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I mean, I look at Eastern Kentucky, which has suffered depopulation for so many years. Every new business that we bring in gives more hope that a child can grow up there, or anywhere else, in the United States of America, and dream as big as they want to dream and hopefully chase that dream, not just in their home state, but in their home region. And I think that the people of rural America want to make sure they’re heard, that they’re not ignored, and also that they’re not treated like just one group that thinks all the same. I mean, rural Kentuckians, just like urban Kentuckians, we are all different.
Everybody grows up with some different views and has different experiences. But understanding some of the challenges that can impact rural America and having more people focused on it, it can only be a good thing.
DY: In 20 years of polling rural voters, the Center for Rural Strategies has found that Democrats don’t have to get a majority of rural votes to win elections. But their chances of victory go way up when they trim their margin of loss in rural areas. It sounds like one part of that is getting jobs in those communities so people can, like you said, not have to move. That they can have opportunities where they grow up, and raise their families where their grandparents are.
AB: We all love where we’re from. And in Kentucky, we have a sense of home that I think is greater than most.
And so for us, for my campaigns, I knew that, sure, we’d have certain margins in Louisville and in the Lexington region, but doing 3% to 5% better in counties across Kentucky, that’s where the votes end up adding up and it makes you a better elected official, which is what this is all supposed to be about. You know, we get caught up in the politics, which is okay, you have to go through that to win. But what happens after you win is supposed to be about service. And I think those that view it that way, especially the way that they govern, shows everyone that they care. And then that opens up some hearts and some minds and can change some voting patterns, too.
DY: I wanted to just quickly go back to this idea of optimism and ask if you have a message for people who are, like I said before, just sort of depressed by the negativity in our national politics. What do you think people should be looking forward to and be optimistic about when we look ahead to the way government can make an impact in our lives? What are some things that you think that we should be optimistic about?
AB: Well, I think we ought to be optimistic that we can get over this crazy partisanship. The picking a team and everything. Right now, you’re asked to pick a team in everything from the car you buy to the beer you drink. Somehow beer became political in the last couple of years, and everything is supposed to be a fight. You know, the folks that I talk to — Democrat, Republican, urban, rural — they’re just exhausted with it. And my hope is that the vice president wins this race and is able to bring us to a better place as a country, governs in a way where neighbors stop arguing with neighbors because we might disagree with our neighbor on a number of issues, but we still want them to do well. And more importantly than that, we want their kids to have opportunity and do well.
We just need that reminder that we are Americans first, and Democrats and Republicans second and third, and that the most important issues that we address oftentimes aren’t political at all. If we can approach governing with empathy and with compassion, then I think that we can get to a better place where we lower the temperature nationally — where you don’t have to wake up and run to the TV every morning and say, what the heck happened now? I just think people are craving a return to some level of normalcy where they can live their lives, still have their opinions, but everything not be a battle every single day because we as Americans aren’t each other’s enemies.
DY: Thank you, Governor Beshear. Is there anything else I didn’t ask that you wanted to mention?
AB: I’ll just end by saying investment in rural America is an investment in America. You know, it’s important that we don’t create divides. That we recognize it’s the golden rule that we love our neighbor as ourself, but that it’s also the parable of the Good Samaritan that says everyone is our neighbor. Every time that we run water to a house that’s never had it, it’s a good thing. Every time that we get internet to a rural business that’s never had it, it’s a good thing. And so my hope is that we get ourselves to a place in politics where we can be for all of it. We can be for investment in urban America, we can be for investment in rural America, because it’s all one America.
This interview first appeared in Path Finders, a weekly email newsletter from the Daily Yonder. Each Monday, Path Finders features a Q&A with a rural thinker, creator, or doer. Join the mailing list today, to have these illuminating conversations delivered straight to your inbox.
This article first appeared on The Daily Yonder and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
