Stacy Abrams Floats 2020 Presidential Run
The woman famous for losing the Georgia governor's race is eyeing a bigger job.
The Democratic field for 2020 is already so large that holding debates featuring all the candidates simultaneously has been ruled out. It could get bigger still.
The Hill (“Stacey Abrams says had considered 2028 run for president, but now open to 2020“):
Stacey Abrams said Monday that 2028 had been the earliest she would consider a run for president under her previous career plan, but said now she regards a run in 2020 as “definitely on the table.”
Abrams had sparked talk earlier when she was seen as ruling out a 2020 run during a talk at the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival.
“In the spreadsheet with all the jobs I wanted to do, 2028 would be the earliest I would be ready to stand for president because I would have done the work I thought necessary to be effective in that job,” the Georgia Democrat had said.
In her comment, Abrams was referring to a passage in her book detailing a spreadsheet with her career plans.
However, Abrams tweeted later on Monday she has not ruled out a 2020 run.
“20 years ago, I never thought I’d be ready to run for POTUS before 2028. But life comes at you fast,” she said in her tweet. “Now 2020 is definitely on the table.”
[…]
Abrams, who narrowly lost Georgia’s gubernatorial race last year, is a rising star in the Democratic Party.
She has also been seen as a potential challenger to Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) in 2020 or to Gov. Brian Kemp (R) in 2022.
The former Georgia House minority leader has remained in the headlines since her narrow loss, giving the Democrats’ official State of the Union response last month.
She doubled down on this in a tweet:
In #LeadFromTheOutside, I explore how to be intentional about plans, but flexible enough to adapt. 20 years ago, I never thought I’d be ready to run for POTUS before 2028. But life comes at you fast – as I shared in Q&A w @Yamiche at @sxsw. Now 2020 is definitely on the table…
— Stacey Abrams (@staceyabrams) March 11, 2019
While there is some support for a Presidential bid in the replies, the overwhelming number urge her to take on Perdue instead. And my guess is that’s what she’ll wind up doing.
By pre-Trump standards, Abrams is simply unqualified for the White House. Her political experience consists of twelve years in Georgia House of Representatives, eight as minority leader. In the modern, pre-Trump era, we’ve never elected a President someone who had not been either a state governor, US Senator, or Vice President of the United States—with the exception of Dwight Eisenhower, who had been a five-star general overseeing all Allied forces during World War II. Even Barack Obama was barely qualified by traditional standards, moving from the Illinois State Senate to the US Senate and then beginning his successful run for the Presidency almost immediately.
Beyond that, I can’t see how Abrams possibly thinks she would break through in this field of seasoned, well-known candidates. She wouldn’t even be the lone African-American woman in the fray.
Again, my strong guess is that Abrams realizes all of this and is simply capitalizing on the buzz following her controversial 2018 loss and subsequent selection to deliver the Democratic response to President Trump’s State of the Union. Even being in the conversation as a possible Presidential contender elevates her standing and increases her chances of being the nominee for the Senate race against Perdue.
Impressive person.
Obviously she was robbed on the GA Governorship.
Terrific job with the Dem response to the SOTU.
I’m sure she has some important things to offer.
Having said that…no way she is going to be the POTUS.
Hope she makes it to the Senate.
Dems have a flood of really good candidates. Meanwhile Trump just submitted a budget that would cut Social security, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, and student loans. And of course gives the military $36 billion more than last year.
Any Democrat 2020!
Anybody else see the Liz Warren Facebook ad brouhaha?
Several posts ago you responded to my comment by saying you didn’t get my point about your comments about women. You still don’t. Your subheading says “the woman famous for losing….” The quoted article says “Abrams, who narrowly lost Georgia’s gubernatorial race last year, is a rising star in the Democratic Party.” There is also substantial evidence that her opponent, then Sec of State, cheated if not committed crimes in order to win against this “loser woman.” Get my point now?
@Dmichael: But none of what I’ve said about Abrams has the slightest thing to do with her being a woman. Nobody outside the state of Georgia heard of her before the governor’s race. She lost it. The circumstances of that loss made her something of a cause celebre and she was chosen to deliver the SOTU response, which was unprecedented.
@Teve: The DNC ought to just cancel the primaries and put “Generic Democrat” on the ballot, then after this ticket defeats Trump in a landslide, then they can hold the primaries to decide who will be the next president.
I mean, why not? It’d be no ballsier than some of the shenanigans we’ve seen from Republicans.
More women than ever ran for congress in 2018, and now more women than ever are running for president. If I were the GOP I’d be feeling grim about the future.
@Kylopod: if everyone running for president on the Democratic side were gathered up on a bus and driven to the White House, with the president to be determined in a dice game, and everybody else to fill out cabinet positions etc, our governance would instantly get a thousand times better. Wouldn’t even matter who gets what. Put Buttigieg in charge of the department of the Interior. Make Kamala Harris FTC Chair. Kirsten Gillibrand at EPA. Don’t Care.
@James Joyner: I doubt many here are fascinated by our exchange so here is my final comment on this issue: Your position appears to be that consistently negative comments about public women have nothing to do with their being women. You may believe that if you wish. I don’t.
@Dmichael:
Do Joyner’s consistently negative reactions to Trump et al have something to do with their being men?
@Michael Reynolds: No, for the obvious reason that those criticisms tend to be about substance and are accurate. Saying that Stacey Abrams was famous for losing is like saying HRC was parsing the meaning of “is” when she said she wasn’t going to run for President. Oh wait, James did that!
@Dmichael:
She is famous for her loss, and she is a woman. Both are points of fact, and neither has anything to do with the other. Change “the woman” for “the person” it changes the meaning not one little bit.
Chill…
“Saying that Stacey Abrams was famous for losing”
That’s not accurate? I had never heard of her before she ran for Senate in GA. Who had?
“like saying HRC was parsing the meaning of “is””
Both Clintons were guilty of this kind of stuff. Think you are searching too hard. This is a politics blog and in general on these kind of blogs politicians get criticized. James, and the other writers, seldom say really good things about any politician. There really isn’t that much good to say most of the time. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.
Steve
@Dmichael: Shorter James: Nope, still don’t.
ETA: If it helps any, my observations related to connotation in English 101 and 102 classes tended to show that male students weren’t as good at it.
@steve:
Yes. Beyond that, I don’t even see this post as critical of Abrams per se. To say that someone is unqualified by resume to be President—which I’ve said mostly about males, including Trump and Obama in this post—is hardly a slam. Few are. Hell, I’m not, nor or all but a handful of men.
@Daryl and his brother Darryl: Compare the subheading for Beto O’Rourke’s possible run.
@Monala:
A different person wrote them. I intentionally make my subheds different from the headline to convey a take and avoid redundancy. Doug’s are almost invariably a longer form of the headline. (I’ve given up trying to get him to stop doing that. ;))
@Monala:
It’s not my job to defend Dr. J…but the stories of the two campaigns are markedly different.
I guess a similar approach to O’Rourke’s story would be “Man famous for almost beating Ted Cruz is eyeing a bigger job.”
O’Rourke came damn near to beating a Republican incumbent in deep red Texas.
Abrams got robbed, and thus she lost.
@James Joyner:
U+1F923)
Had to look that up…
@Daryl and his brother Darryl: Ha. It’s supposed to auto-render but I guess not.
@Daryl and his brother Darryl: Additionally, I should note, Doug’s article on O’Rourke definitely questions his qualifications for many of the same reasons Joyner questions Abrams’. In fact, the two articles are quite similar and hit upon more or less the same points.
Of course, it remains a fact that O’Rourke did become a much bigger “star” than Abrams in the course of his failed Senate campaign. Why that’s the case is a reasonable question. (I personally think it’s more complicated than simply racism or sexism–the prospect of unseating Ted Cruz in Texas was always going to be more exciting than winning the governorship in an open race in Georgia–but I do think it’s a factor.) But that’s got nothing in particular to do with the OTB hosts.
“the prospect of unseating Ted Cruz”
Yup. I wouldn’t know who Abrams ran against unless I looked it up. OTOH, who doesn’t dislike Cruz? Even lots of Republicans dont like him, even if they still vote for him.
Steve
@Kylopod:
Granting that racism and sexism are always a factor, I think that’s right.
As I noted a few times during the campaign, whether here or on Twitter, I live in Northern Virginia but saw more BETO! signs than I did for the Republican nominee for Senate here in Virginia. I saw no Abrams signs.
Even though he’s been in the House for a few years, I had never heard of Beto until the video of his response on the question about athletes kneeling during the National Anthem went viral. That made him famous nationally. The fact that he was close to knocking off Ted Cruz, a hated Republican, made him a sensation.
Few of us pay much attention to governor’s races outside our own state. Nobody in Virginia or Kansas really much cares whether Republicans or Democrats sit in the Georgia governor’s chair. The reason the race—and thus Abrams—became a national focus was because of attempts to suppress the black vote. She became something of a cause for national Democrats after the fact.
@Daryl and his brother Darryl: some one sated she was robbed in the Georgia vote. Well the other white candidates that lost before her were they robbed and stated racism as the cause too? I am a black democrat who did not vote for Stacy Abrams , so I guess there is something wrong with me. I did not vote vote for Stacy Abrams and would not vote for her, she did not pay her IRs taxes and is a tax attorney and should know better, her excuse her dad was sick if well everyone had that excuse where would did country be. Two, during the campaign she called Kemp incompetent, if Kemp called her that, all blacks would be at his door steps calling him a racist and demanding his resignation. Look at her size, if she cannot control what she puts in her mouth and push away from the table, how the he** can she run a state much less a country. During the campaign, acted like a militant, at war with who? Shouting, the documented and undocumented. The democrats continue to push illegal immigration, pretending that there is no negative effects on the black community, when in reality they are hit the hardest by illegals coming into this country. Property taxes for the elderly on a fixed income go sky high,, teachers spend most of their time trying to understand Spanish speaking children. By eight grade her child cannot read. The dems do not care about the American blacks, they need and want the Hispanics to expand their voting base. Black people are losing and losing badly.
@DollyBee:
You wrote: “I am a black democrat….”
And then you wrote: “if Kemp called her that, all blacks would be at his door steps calling him a racist and demanding his resignation.”
Does. Not. Compute. Does. Not. Compute.
@DollyBee: You may be black, but you’ve mastered all the Republican trolling points. Who was the last Democratic presidential nominee you voted for?
@SC_Birdflyte:
Again, look at what DollyBee wrote: “if Kemp called her that, all blacks would be at his door steps calling him a racist and demanding his resignation.”
That sentence is effectively a confession that DollyBee is as black as I am.
I guess you must be in seventh grade…
I wonder why blacks continue to give their overwhelming support to the Democratic Party…I wonder why the overwhelming majority of black politicians are Democrats…perhaps they are as stupid as you? Nah…
@Daryl and his brother Darryl:
Who’s going to be next- Willie Nelson?
Where’s Alan Keyes?
“Me and you and a dog named Blue”