After years of close calls, red herrings, and an election period that grew closer and closer, Democrats won Georgia in this year’s presidential election for the first time since 1992.
The victory shattered Republican locks on the southern states in the Elect Oral Ralph College Ledge, but it also backed Stage Abrams, the Georgia Democrat and former House minority leader, which has become synonymous with the party’s efforts to win statewide. Ms. Abrams, who has helped organizations start new voter registration and fight voter repression, said the victory was a personal relief – a political boom when she lost her governorship in 2001.
In an interview with the Times, he outlined how he believed Mr. Biden had won and that liberal groups in other southern states could mimic Georgia’s path. She also weighed in on the current divisions in the Democratic Party and its future political plans.
These are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Georgia turns blue after all these decades of work. How did you feel when it became clear? Was that support? Was there relief? What was the feeling?
I think this was a combination of relief and excitement about what it meant. But also a healthy dose of reality – we’ve done this, but it’s easily achieved, which means more work remains to be done.
I can’t say support in the sense that there is some beating in the chest, but I’m excited about how this model of making tapestries of leaders on racial and geographical lines proves. I’ve had the privilege of being part of building resources and infrastructure and storytelling, helping to bring different communities together, we all work towards the same goal. Over the course of a decade, and with the resources that made it a success.
What was different about the voters in the coalition this time? What happened in 2020 that was not able to be completed in 2018 or 2016?
Well, I think there are two pieces to this. One is that demographic change is ongoing, and each cycle is an opportunity not only to register them but to stop them. So you build voting muscle memory, you build the ability to get involved, because people have more information and a deeper understanding of their ability and their potential as voters.
I will draw a distinction between 2016 2016 and 2020, using 2018 as a marker, because what happened was that we were able to remove significant restrictions on voter access.
Voter repression was a major factor in shaping the turnout in 2018 and 2016. In 2018, we invested very deeply in the voting of real voters, but we still confuse voter purification, accurate match closing, old machines that were seen incorrectly. And vaguely deployed, broken machines and then super rejection rejection rates, comparatively, of black and brown voters in absent or temporary ballot space.
So what we were able to identify – solidly in 2018 – we were able to reduce the headline in 2020.
And so I think you have seen an increase in voter turnout through this election by another 800,000 people registering and registering by November 2018. But you also had to remove and reduce a number of barriers that block blocked access to voting.
I think it’s really important, as much as people are excited about the active work that we were able to bring voters to the polls, we can’t ignore that incredible change because voters were really able to make it through Gitntlet and count their votes.
What were those early years like? Do you believe when you say that Georgia can be a democratic state?
I became a minority leader in November 2010, two weeks after the most damage suffered by Democrats in Georgia’s history. We lost every statewide lost fee. We have lost the Senate by supermajority. We lost more members of the State House. And we were heading for a redistricting year where Republicans draw themselves, on paper, 124 out of 180 seats.
I traveled around the country to raise money for house races and get people to invest Almost impossible, people did not see the recognition of Georgia’s victory. They drew attention to the 2008 election when the Obama campaign determined that we were not yet viable, so no investment was made. In 2012, I was unable to take advantage of the fact that donors had to invest in the campaign as a hook. So he was really a small cadre of donors, largely philanthropic that I took myself to meet. I would say, “I know you don’t think Georgia is real, but let me tell you what it might look like.”
Each cycle, I would take the same deck and update it and say, “We were here. And we’re going here. And when this thing seems extra, let me tell you what’s different now.”
I’ve always loved those lines, “Give me a place to stand and I can move the world.” Well, give me a place to stand and I can assure you that Georgia is real.
What was your lowest point at the time? At that moment you questioned whether it was possible or not?
Redirection ended in 2011. The Republicans passed the map that gave them a disproportionate share everywhere, full of black communities, it breaks down Latino communities. He is the only Latino legislator in the majority white district. And allowed maps. It was December 2011, when Republicans were allowed to racially greymander in the state of Georgia, and that was heartbreaking for me. It meant that the only way of salvation that came to us was to go backwards.
There will be no new map. No claim will be made. We had to do this by finding every voter we could and this would take a lot longer than I expected, but not more than I could have imagined.
Looking ahead, how can Democrats keep the coalition they saw in November without Trump on the ballot? Naturally, Senate runoffs are the first step.
This election coalition was in my election in 2018. This is the alliance we have been building together over the last decade through groups like Asian-American Advocacy Funds, Black Lives Matter, Coalition for People’s Agenda, Migante, Southern on New Ground. So this is a group that just didn’t come out of convenience. We are working together in a coalition and that is why I think we can sustain it.
What about other states? Why didn’t Democrats see similar gains in other states through the South on election day?
I can’t talk about what didn’t happen in other states, I can tell you that Georgia has the most diverse electorate in any war-torn state. We have seen a dramatic increase not only in voter turnout, but also in voter turnout. Since 2016, Latino and AAPI voters have grown rapidly.
We disagree with the analysis done by The Upshot. We believe that the black share is actually 29 percent and is consistent where it was. It has declined slightly as we have seen a sharp increase in Latino and AAPI voters and I reject the assumption that I lost 2% of the black vote share.
But we didn’t just see the voter turnout expand, we saw a 72 percent increase in Latino turnout. AAPI voters have increased by 91 per cent, Black voters have increased their turnout by 20 per cent. White voters have increased them by 16 percent. So we were able to increase all those margins and we also continued to increase the share of white voters. And that combination is important. This is an alliance that does not really exist in other states at the level that exists here in Georgia.
There are divisions among Democrats, especially the middle and some progressive on the ballot results. It is your honor in both camps. Do you think messages like “defaming the police” hurt the party in the House and Senate races?
I think you campaign for where you live. And I have always held the reality that we are on the spectrum of progress. There are people who have made it forward with the spectrum. There are other communities that are struggling to find our way. And the responsibility of every election of every campaign is to identify where you are, but also where you can go.
But it should focus on local communities how broad and how far the vision can reach.
I don’t think it’s helpful to try to push everyone into the same mold. I translate “progressive” into “southern” about the progress I’m making here, because I know there’s a conversation that’s absolutely necessary, but you can’t get it if you don’t create a language to describe the language . And we have to work on building the language before we can shout.
But is that a zero sum? The word we hear from some moderate members of the House is that some of these progressive members and that slogan are given too much space and it hurts them.
For the Democratic Party, it is our burden and our advantage that we are facing diversity. Republicans rarely have to engage because of the uniform nature of their belief system. When you are against most things, it is not necessary to specify what you are for.
And this is a broad generalization and I know it, but the Democrats always had to recognize that in the big tent we built, we would have strong conversations within it. And those conversations are always bursting into the atmosphere. Republicans will use those conversations as weapons. And it may be a whisper or it may be screaming, but they are looking for a way to benefit them.
Our responsibility is to make sure we have a basic understanding of who we are.
Are you ready to run for governor in 2022?
I focus on January 5, and make sure we can send John Osof and Rafael Warnock to the United States Senate.
Do you have a timetable for making that decision?
I am only January 5th.
