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FRANKFORT, Ky. — Gavin Newsom was in his element, moving and shaking amid the rich and powerful in Davos.
He scolded European leaders for supposedly cowering before President Trump.
He drew disparaging notice during a presidential rant and captured headlines after being blocked from delivering a high-profile speech, allegedly at the behest of the White House.
All the while, another governor and Democratic presidential prospect was mixing and mingling in the rarefied Swiss air — though you probably wouldn’t know it.
Flying far below the heat-seeking radar, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear leaned into the role of economic ambassador, focusing on job creation and other nutsy, boltsy stuff that doesn’t grab much notice in today’s performative political environment.
Like Newsom, Beshear is running-but-not-exactly-running for president. He didn’t set out to offer a stark contrast to California’s governor, the putative 2028 Democratic front-runner. But he’s doing so just the same.
Want someone who’ll match Trump insult for insult, over-the-top meme for over-the-top meme and howl whenever the president commits some new outrage? Look to Sacramento, not Frankfort.
“I think by the time we reach 2028, our Democratic voters are gonna be worn out,” Beshear said during a conversation in his state’s snowy capital. “They’re gonna be worn out by Trump, and they’re gonna be worn out by Democrats who respond to Trump like Trump. And they’re gonna want some stability in their lives.”
Every candidate enters a contest with a backstory and a record, which is condensed to a summary that serves as calling card, strategic foundation and a rationale for their run.
Here’s Andy Beshear’s: He’s the popular two-term governor of a red state that three times voted overwhelmingly for Trump.
He is fluent in the language of faith, well-liked by the kind of rural voters who have abandoned Democrats in droves and, at age 48, offers a fresh face and relative youth in a party that many voters have come to see as old and ossified.
The fact he’s from the South, where Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton emerged the last time Democrats experienced this kind of existential freak-out, also doesn’t hurt.
Beshear’s not-yet-candidacy, still in the fledgling phase, offers a mix of aspiration and admonition.
Democrats, he said, need to talk more like regular people. Addiction, not substance use disorder. Hunger, not food assistance.
And, he suggested, they need to focus more on things regular people care about: jobs, healthcare, public safety, public education. Things that aren’t theoretical or abstract but materially affect their daily lives, like the costs of electricity, car insurance and groceries.
“I think the most important thing we should have learned from 2024 is [Democratic voters are] gonna be looking for somebody that can help them pay that next bill,” Beshear said.
He was seated in the Old Governor’s Mansion, now a historic site and Beshear’s temporary office while the nearby Capitol undergoes a years-long renovation.
The red-brick residence, built in the Federal style and completed in 1798, was Beshear’s home from age 6 to 10 when his father, Steve, lived there while serving as lieutenant governor. (Steve Beshear went on to serve two terms as the state’s chief executive, building a brand and a brand name that helped Andy win his first public office, attorney general, in 2015.)
It was 9 degrees outside. Icicles hung from the eaves and snowplows navigated Frankfort’s narrow, winding streets after an unusually cold winter blast.
Inside, Beshear was seated before an unlit fireplace, legs crossed, shirt collar unbuttoned, looking like the pleasantly unassuming Dad in a store-bought picture frame.
He bragged a bit, touting Kentucky’s economic success under his watch. He spoke of his religiosity — his grandfather and great-grandfather were Baptist preachers — and talked at length about the optimism, a political rarity these days, that undergirds his vision for the country.
“I think the American people feel like the pendulum swung too far in the Biden administration. Now they feel it’s swung way too far during the Trump administration,” Beshear said. “What they want is for it to stop swinging.”
He went on. “Most people when they wake up aren’t thinking about politics. They’re thinking about their job, their next doctor’s appointment, the roads and bridges they drive, the school they drop their kids off at, and whether they feel safe in their community.
“And I think they desperately want someone that can move the country, not right or left ideologically, but actually forward in those areas. And that’s how I think we heal.”
Beshear doesn’t shy from his Democratic pedigree, or stray from much of the party’s orthodoxy.
Seeking reelection in 2023, he seized on the abortion issue and the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe vs. Wade to batter and best his Republican opponent.
He’s walked the picket line with striking auto workers, signed an executive order making Juneteenth a state holiday and routinely vetoed anti-gay legislation, becoming the first Kentucky governor to attend an LGBTQ+ celebration in the Capitol Rotunda.
“Discrimination against our LGBTQ+ community is unacceptable,” he told an audience. “It holds us back and, in my Kentucky accent, it ain’t right.”
For all of that, Beshear doesn’t shrink from taking on Trump, which, essentially, has become a job requirement for any Democratic officeholder wishing to remain a Democratic officeholder.
After the president’s rambling Davos address, Beshear called Trump’s remarks “dangerous, disrespectful and unhinged.”
“From insulting our allies to telling struggling Americans that he’s fixed inflation and the economy is amazing, the President is hurting both our families’ financial security and our national security,” Beshear posted on social media. “Oh, and Greenland is so important he’s calling it Iceland.”
But Beshear hasn’t turned Trump-bashing into a 24/7 vocation, or a weight-lifting contest where the winner is the critic wielding the heaviest bludgeon.
“I stand up to him in the way that I think a Democratic governor of Kentucky should. When he’s doing things that hurt my state, I speak out,” Beshear said. “I filed 20 lawsuits, I think, and we’ve won almost all of them, bringing dollars they were trying to stop from flowing into Kentucky.
“But,” he added, “when he does something positive for Kentucky, I also say that too, because that’s what our people expect.”
Asked about the towel-snapping Newsom and his dedicated staff of Trump trollers, Beshear defended California’s governor — or, at least, passed on the chance to get in a dig.
“Gavin’s in a very different situation than I’m in. I mean, he has the president attacking him and his state just about every day,” Beshear said. “So I don’t want to be critical of an approach from somebody that’s in a very different spot.
“But the approach also has to be unique to you. For me, I bring people together. We’ve been able to do that in this state. That’s my approach. And in the end, I’ve gotta stay true to who I am.”
And when — or make that if — both Newsom and Beshear launch a formal bid for president, they’ll present Democratic voters a clear choice.
Not just between two differing personalities. Also two considerably different approaches to politics and winning back the White House.
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Mark Z. Barabak
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