'Never Throw Anyone Under the Bus': Andy Beshear's LGBTQ Bet For 2028

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Andy Beshear knows he’s the Governor of a deep-Red state. He knows the Democratic elite in places like Washington, D.C. and San Francisco don’t fully appreciate the governing environment he has to navigate in Kentucky.

Here’s what else Andy Beshear knows: he’s leading his Trump-loving state while remaining the most popular Democratic state CEO in the country, making him an automatic contender for the biggest promotion in politics in 2028, though a less talked about one so far. Which is why it’s all the more striking that Beshear is leaning hard into his support for LGBTQ rights—and specifically the transgender community—as some others in the party are doing the exact opposite.

“When people are attacked, I believe you stand up for them,” Beshear told me on Sunday in Washington. “That doesn't mean that's the only thing you talk about. That doesn't mean it's the dominant thing you talk about.”

I was speaking with Beshear on the sidelines of the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund, where he was being honored for his record on the issue. While he’s been drawing more national attention for appearances at events like Al Sharpton’s National Action Network conference in New York and his digs at J.D. Vance (“There is no one who will work harder, no matter what I am doing next year, to beat J.D. Vance in 2028”), his approach to events like this one in a hotel ballroom on the banks of the Potomac shows how he may be running a more Clintonian shadow campaign than other presidential prospects, one in which he wields his faith as a shield and compassion as a sword.

“I won reelection as a pro-diversity, pro-LGBTQ-plus rights Governor in a deep-Red state at a time when people were questioning if that was possible,” Beshear told the room of monied gays. “Now some people may have told you that somebody with views like that can't win a statewide election in a place like Kentucky. Folks, I'm living, breathing proof that it is possible to win everywhere if we stand firm on our values of compassion, of empathy, and of doing right by our neighbors. All of them, no exceptions.”

Those in attendance were already well aware of Beshear’s LGBTQ bonafides. In 2021, he was the first Governor of Kentucky to declare June as Pride Month. And he was the first Kentucky Governor to attend an LBGTQ rally a year earlier—one dubbed The Fairness Rally lest it be too in-your-face about the topic. And he’s more recently stood up for trans people in Kentucky against strong political winds. 

To be sure, Beshear’s biggest battles on LGBTQ rights have mostly ended with Ls. Yes, he vetoed bills banning gender-affirming care, trans athletes in school sports, and allowing students to use the bathroom of their choice. He also fought legislation that endorsed so-called conversion therapy, calling it “torture.” But in the end, Kentucky’s state legislature overrode those vetoes, meaning his pen carried a performative rejection, not a policy rejoinder. And in December, he said he did not support taxpayer-funded surgeries for trans inmates—an issue that dogged Kamala Harris—but framed it as not wanting to see incarcerated people “receiving better coverage and health care than a law-abiding citizen.”

Even so, Beshear’s record helps him lay down clear lines of contrast with some of his likely rivals for the Democratic nomination should he seek it.

“So what advice do I give candidates? Never throw anyone under the bus. Stand up for your convictions,” he says.

In case the subtext wasn’t obvious, Beshear is setting up a direct difference with California Gov. Gavin Newsom, the all-but-declared contender who has said Democrats had mangled the issue of transgender rights, especially when it comes to student athletes. 

While Newsom has one of the most pro-LGBTQ records of any governor in history, he angered much of the party’s base last year with comments on trans athletes, most notably in his debut as a podcaster, in which he told Charlie Kirk that transgender athletes participating in girls’ sports was “deeply unfair.”

“I completely agree with you on that. It is an issue of fairness. It’s deeply unfair,” Newsom told Kirk.” “I am not wrestling with the fairness issue. I totally agree with you.”

Also hanging out there awkwardly, Pete Buttigieg is not-so-subtly keeping himself in the game. The former Transportation Secretary made history in 2020 as the first openly gay man to earn delegates to the Democratic convention before stepping aside to endorse Joe Biden. He sat out the race for an open Senate seat in Michigan. No one thinks he’ll do the same for the White House race.

Yet here was Beshear, mingling with champagne-swilling lobbyists and activists in the basement of a hotel on the banks of the Potomac last Sunday morning. Waiters passed snacks and a jazz band played while Democratic National Committee Chairman Ken Martin and some of the party’s biggest bundlers maneuvered through the room. (Technically, the LGBTQ+ Victory Fund is non-partisan, but it’s a stretch to find a Republican in these crowds.) Democratic candidates for state legislature and positions like Connecticut Treasurer, Rhode Island Attorney General, and Colorado Secretary of State made their pitches to the donor class. Beshear, in a navy suit and dress sneakers, was the most popular draw, largely from those who wanted to know if the man being honored might meet the moment.

“A pastor of mine once said, ‘You know your faith has been hijacked when suddenly your god hates all the same people that you do,'” Beshear said, testing a line that left the crowd contemplating. But he was quick to show he wasn’t confused about the limits of his allyship: “I'll never pretend that I can understand what it feels like to be discriminated against, but I can listen. I can try to do the right thing and we can work together to build not just the better Commonwealth of Kentucky, but a better United States of America.”

It’s an interesting approach to a field that could carry as many as two dozen contenders, from big-state Governors, former Cabinet Secretaries, progressive heroes, national security Senators, and maybe even an ESPN anchor or late-night host. The fact that Beshear is preparing to release a campaign-style book this summer is lost on no one, nor is his busy travel schedule that had him waking up in Michigan before dawn that very Sunday after a day of stops at that state’s Democratic convention in Detroit. Also of note is Beshear’s current role as chair of the Democratic Governors Association this cycle, giving him facetime with a lot of mega-donors as he leads the party’s campaign arm for gubernatorial races across the country.

The 48-year-old son of a former Kentucky Governor is showing the signs of a nascent national campaign despite polling that shows him with just 2% support. That said, these numbers at this point are just a game of name ID and he is drawing the attention of the right Democrats in Washington. And after having watched swing states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Arizona, and Nevada elect both Donald Trump and a Democratic Senate candidate on the same day in 2024, many in the party are looking for someone who can appeal to the voters who simply did not show up for Kamala Harris, while maintaining excitement among the more liberal base.

Beshear’s calibration may lie in this simple fact: he explained his actions to his voters. “There should never be a false choice between rejecting discrimination and winning elections,” he said in his remarks on Sunday. “Your rights as people are not negotiable. They are not a sacrificial lamb or a bargaining chip and they are not some political issue to debate on cable news. The idea that discrimination is wrong should not be a partisan issue. Discrimination is wrong because it's wrong.”

So Beshear vetoed bill after bill, knowing he was going to be overturned by a veto-proof majority in Lexington, Ky. He faced $10 million in negative ads on trans issues in the 2023 election alone. But the man who won his first race for Governor in 2019 by less than one percentage point went on to win re-election in 2023 by five points in a state Trump would carry a year later by 31 points. (It was a harbinger for last year’s race for Governor in Virginia, where Abigail Spanberger won despite $9 in anti-trans ads as a headwind; her margin was 15 points.)

That has not meant national Republicans are shying away from once again using the issue of trans rights as a tool to keep the base agitated. Trump and his allies in Washington have tacked anti-trans provisions onto an election integrity bill that has passed the House but faces a steep climb in the Senate. It’s a move aimed at keeping the culture wars alive heading into a midterm election cycle expected to be rough for Republicans.

Beshear is clear that he’s not running to be the LGBTQ-specific candidate. “I spend 80% of my time on things that matter to 100% percent of the people of Kentucky,” he tells me in a hallway before the speech. “That's jobs. That's your access to a doctor in your own community. So roads and bridges you drive, the school you drop your kids off at, and whether you feel safe in your community. I try to just communicate like a normal human being.”

But there’s a way to fold in his pitch as a fighting candidate who will help make sure Trumpism is not staying in the White House into yet another decade.

“What we should be talking about is how everything's too expensive. How, with the job that anyone has right now, it's hard to pay the bills. We should be talking about how the average age of home ownership for the first time is almost 40 years old. And the fact that people can't take their kids on the same vacation they grew up going on. Democrats should primarily be talking about the American dream and how it's slipping away under this President,” Beshear tells me. “With that said, when people are attacked, we should stand up for them and their rights.”

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