From what was predicted to be record-breaking voter turnout to the number of women running in gubernatorial races, the 2022 midterm elections were historic. However, for all the victories worth touting, a disappointing status quo that remains: America has never elected a single Black woman governor. Each of the three Black women who ran in this cycle — Stacey Abrams in Georgia, Deidre DeJear in Iowa, and Yolanda Flowers in Alabama — lost her race. It’s a disappointing result a mere two years after Joe Biden and Kamala Harris credited Black voters for securing their victory.
For all the victories worth touting, a disappointing status quo that remains: America has never elected a single Black woman governor.
Though Black women voters are often called the “backbone of the Democratic Party,” winning statewide office is an uphill battle for Black women. That lip service doesn’t often translate to actual results, as we’re seeing in these three gubernatorial races. It’s an upsetting turn of events, especially since Abrams, a former Georgia state representative, is a rising force in Democratic politics. Not only did Biden consider her a potential running mate in 2020, but she’s also one of the architects of a new voter registration movement in Georgia and the broader South. Since 2014, the New Georgia Project and Fair Fight, two organizations that Abrams founded, have registered more than 500,000 new voters in the state while sounding the alarm about escalating attempts to suppress the vote.
As Abrams told me during her first gubernatorial bid, Georgia is “52% white, 33% African American, 9.5% Latino, and 4.5% Asian Pacific Islander, which means we have a fairly evenly distributed racial composition between whites and nonwhites. Within those groupings, the largest community of color is African American. That means that in terms of an electoral opportunity, if you can cobble together a coalition of white progressives, African American, Latino and Asian voters, you can win an election in Georgia.” And yet, her deep understanding of Georgia’s electorate wasn’t enough to guarantee her a historic victory.
Her opponent, Gov. Brian Kemp, who was projected the winner by NBC News, led by almost 8 percentage points, after 96% of votes had been tallied. Kemp had roughly 2.1 million votes to Abrams’ 1.8 million. “I got into this for a fight, for what we know to be true deep down in our bones — that the state of Georgia, the people of Georgia, deserve more,” Abrams said in her passionate concession speech. “We want to live in a Georgia that works for everyone,” she continued. “A Georgia where every person has a voice in our democracy and doesn’t have to show up early to make it so because voting is a fundamental right, not a privilege for the wealthy few.”
There are several reasons Abrams has been unsuccessful in two gubernatorial races: While Georgia is becoming more progressive as its politics change with an influx of new residents, it’s still a Southern state with all the historical baggage that accompanies that designation. Is that population ready for a Black woman governor who is unmarried and childless? We may never know. Beyond that, Abrams focused on these underserved populations — as she planned to — and has turned them into a reliable voting bloc. That means addressing the issues that seemingly matter most to them, such as paying teachers more, extending funding for child care and preschool, increasing the amount of affordable housing available in Georgia and enshrining abortion rights. These are all progressive causes that should’ve driven voters to the polls for Abrams the same way they did for Sen. Raphael Warnock, the Black Democratic incumbent. Warnock, who won more votes than his Republican opponent and made the runoff Tuesday, campaigned to secure votes from independents.
For example, instead of leaning into the liberatory Baptist tradition of the historic Ebenezer Baptist Church, which he pastors, Warnock emphasized the work he did with Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., to increase protection for peanut farmers. That might explain why a Quinnipiac University poll released weeks before the election found Warnock significantly outperforming Abrams among likely independent voters. Abrams has been credited with helping secure the state of Georgia for Biden in 2020 and helping elect Democrats Jon Ossoff and Warnock to the Senate, but her understanding of state electoral politics hasn’t translated into a victory for her in either of her gubernatorial campaigns.
It’s an upsetting reality that visionary Black women activists are accustomed to experiencing.
It’s an upsetting reality that visionary Black women activists are accustomed to experiencing. Just take the example of Ida B. Wells-Barnett. After spending decades helping to usher in suffrage, specifically for Black women in Chicago, and being instrumental in helping elect Lucy Flower, the first woman to hold a statewide position in Illinois, she attempted to run for office in Illinois in 1916, and, like Abrams, she lost. Similarly, Fannie Lou Hamer, one of the architects of Freedom Summer and a voting rights powerhouse, lost her 1964 bid to unseat Jamie Whitten, D-Miss., who was seeking a 13th term. While Black women’s work is used to elect others, it rarely translates into them being elected for statewide office. After all, there have only been two Black women U.S. senators, and after Harris’ ascension to the vice presidency, there are no Black women in the Senate.
If Black women are truly the key for Democrats to win elections, then Democrats must do better at helping them win statewide races. Who knows what all that may entail, but it has to be possible. There’s little doubt that Abrams is the future of progressive politics. She understands what putting Band-Aids over gaping social wounds in the name of incrementalism costs the coalition of voters she’s looking to help. The question is: Will Georgia, or America, ever be progressive enough to elect her?
