The Democrat Stacey Abrams has recognized defeat to republican Brian Kemp in the race for governor of Georgia. 10 days after the midterm elections Abrams has said he will not be able to win, but warned that he will continue to fight in court against Brian, who was Georgia’s secretary of state, with a demand for the “bad handling” of the elections.
In a defiant tone during the press conference, Abrams said her actions do not constitute a concession, but she acknowledged that she had no more legal options to prevent Kemp from being declared the winner.
“Let’s be clear: this is not a concession speech,” she said. “Because concession means recognizing that an action was correct, true or appropriate.
Officials from the Abrams campaign had told the Associated Press on Thursday that the candidate was considering the unprecedented maneuver to invoke a state law that would allow her to question the results based on “misconduct, fraud or irregularities. enough to change or question the results.”
However, ultimately, she refused to do so.
Accepting Abrams’ decision to end his campaign, Kemp said he appreciated “his passion, his hard work and his commitment to public service.”
“The election is over and the working Georgians are ready to move forward,” he said. “We can no longer insist on the dividing policies of the past, but we must focus on the bright and promising future of Georgia.”
Kemp, a 55-year-old businessman, has been secretary of state since 2010. He was backed by the president, Donald Trump, while trying to maintain the dominance of the Republican Party in a state that has not elected a Democrat for the governor’s mansion. since 1998.
Kemp reached the Republican Party nomination with ads showing a candidate doing everything from running a chainsaw, pointing a gun at an alleged suitor to his daughter (in jest), to capturing illegal immigrants in the box of his pickup truck up’.
Among his campaign promises was a tax cut, teacher salary increases and again not expanding Medicaid Medicaid in Georgia, a program that is seen as a legacy of former President Obama.
The Abrams campaign mobilized the Democrats of Georgia as in few electoral contests and turned it into a rising star within their party. The electoral participation of both parties was almost as high as that of the presidential vote in 2016, a real exception for an intermediate election.
Abrams campaign advisors said that since the election he had been struggling with a hierarchy of priorities. On the one hand, he wanted to highlight his assertions that Georgia’s electoral process – which was overseen by Kemp as secretary of state – makes it difficult for some citizens to participate. On the other hand, he had also acknowledged that a prolonged legal battle would damage the cause and also hurt his political future.
Kemp’s victory will prolong the control of the Republican Party over the governor’s mansion. His victory is also an important marker for Republicans before the 2020 presidential election. The narrow margin he won suggests that Georgia, a state that Donald Trump won by 5 percentage points in 2016, could be a real battlefield in 2020
Trump opted for Kemp, backing him before the second round in the primary elections of the Republican Party and campaigning for him the weekend before the November 6 election. Now, Trump may return with a titular governor while seeking a second term.
Abrams’ political future is less secure. He turned the old Democratic guard in Georgia into believers after they did not expect a black woman to be able to compete in a general election and became the leader of the party. However, the party has many ambitious politicians who will try to take advantage of the path that Abrams has paved. The next important opportunity for both parties will be the election for the 2020 Senate, with Republican Senator David Perdue making his first re-election bid.