r/politics • u/IWantPizza555 • Jul 08 '26

No Paywall Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear requests update on Sen. Mitch McConnell's health

https://www.whas11.com/article/news/politics/national-politics/kentucky-governor-andy-beshear-requests-update-senator-mitch-mcconnell-health/417-b9252baa-29ab-489e-94f1-147aa41e78ed
28.6k Upvotes

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1.4k

u/classof78 Jul 08 '26

Kentucky is being denied one of her senators. If McConnell doesn't show up, the Governor needs to act. Force the GOP to respond....for once.

151

u/Rackem_Willy Jul 08 '26

That's what I'm saying. Kentucky is being left without sufficient representation. The governor should proceed with scheduling a special election unless proven otherwise.

15

u/redtens Jul 08 '26

Kentucky is being left

we can only hope

3

u/surelyfunke20 Jul 08 '26

this sure does sufficiently represent the Republican Party.

2

u/BitBrain Jul 08 '26

You're saying McConnell was sufficiently representing us before? Interesting.

7

u/Ferelar New Jersey Jul 08 '26

He did keep getting re-elected by Kentuckyans. Kentuckans? Kentuckians. I personally find basically everything about him reprehensible and found him to be a duplicitous scheming worm of a man, but the people of Kentucky didn't primary him or vote against him, so as much as that's also the fault of our terrible electoral system, technically, yeah, the representation was there with him "alive".

2

u/DavisSqShenanigans Jul 08 '26

As sufficient as it gets in the current system. He keeps getting elected and not even by slim margins.

1

u/BitBrain Jul 08 '26

I kinda get it - if your senator is the majority leader you have some illusion of extra special senator powers and why would you vote that away?

1

u/Chief_Chill Illinois Jul 08 '26

Not like Mitch can object, it appears..

11

u/TheBlueRabbit11 Jul 08 '26

If you do the math, even with one senator, each Kentuckian gets almost 4.3 times as much representation as each Californian.

1

u/BinOfBargains Jul 09 '26

I mean, to be fair, the Senate was never designed to give equal representation for each citizen. That’s what the House is for. Though whether or not the House gives equal representation to each citizen (it doesn’t) is definitely its own topic. The Senate is designed to give equal representation at the state level, which it does if you look purely at the numbers (or at least it did until somebody decided to stop showing up).

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u/vandreulv Jul 08 '26

If McConnell doesn't show up, the Governor needs to act.

This IS the Governor acting and trying to get the GOP to respond, dingus.

5

u/thundercockjk2 Pennsylvania Jul 08 '26

No, it isn't, it's political theater. Other comments below she how the governor can wield his power, instead he wants to do this the nice way and it's so telling.

1

u/snakefinn Jul 08 '26

What can he do? He doesn't have the ability to appoint a replacement anymore

10

u/onlymostlydead Washington Jul 08 '26

State constitution says otherwise, and Beshear said as much when he vetoed it (and was subsequently overridden).

So...fun times ahead!

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u/[deleted] Jul 08 '26

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542

u/FreeBusRide Jul 08 '26 edited Jul 08 '26

Yes we do. That's why Beshear was elected. He is doing good work for Kentucky and I would be happy to vote for him for president.

Edit because I spelled his name wrong but I learned to read in Kentucky lol.

132

u/NoCoolNameMatt Jul 08 '26

Lol. Take my upvote for the self deprecating humor.

48

u/cclan2 Jul 08 '26

Fire edit

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u/ZamsAndHams Jul 08 '26

Upvote for the hilarious self deprecation.

6

u/DrDerpberg Canada Jul 08 '26

Do you think there's a chance Kentucky flips? My understanding is it's a state which in theory should be wide open to policies good for the working class but the propaganda runs deep.

12

u/howisthisacrime Jul 08 '26

I live in Northern Kentucky and most of the people in my area don't support Mitch or Trump, but I think we are outnumbered so I doubt there's a chance Kentucky flips.

7

u/Grey_0ne Jul 08 '26

I lived in Kentucky for 30 years (Louisville, Oldham County, Morehead, Constantine) and never once - not even a single time in my life - met a person who claimed to like or claimed to have voted for Mitch...

And yet he won election after election almost the entire time I've been alive.

7

u/howisthisacrime Jul 08 '26

There's a lot of them though. I have distant cousins down near Louisville that are big Trump fans. I don't speak to them, but I can only assume they're Mitch fans as well. Lots of places in the rural areas that don't pay much attention to politics outside of what Fox tells them.

2

u/LordDaedalus Jul 08 '26

2020 saw record voter turnout across the country so it's kind of an exception year, but rewind to Mitch's election before that in 2014 and less than half of eligible voters actually voted in Kentucky(45%). If y'all had mail in voting like we do in Oregon you'd likely be rid of him already, we're hitting regular 75% turnouts and even our city council elections are getting in the ~60% range statewide for turnout.

The unsung greatness of vote by mail is that even if you think there aren't enough people like you to make the difference, it really doesn't take that much effort to correctly fill out your ballot. The more of a pain in the ass going and waiting in long lines taking time off work to vote is, the more people lean into the "will it really make any difference" mindset so it's hard to get a good read on how competitive a party might be if everyone who could vote did.

I'm autistic, don't do well in crowds, it'd definitely be a challenge getting myself to brave it in person if I didn't have mail-in voting. Plus noisy unfamiliar environments tend to hit me with brain fog and feeling flustered, which is just perfect for making decisions on how society gets run; I might vote for three raccoons in a trenchcoat in that state.

Anyway fuck Mitch McConnell.

7

u/pee-oui Jul 08 '26

Only remotely possible Andy gets the nomination, but unfortunately even then I don't see it happening. Would love to be wrong. Al Gore did not win his home state of Tennessee in 2000, as the incumbent Vice President, and the partisanship and Republicans' utter disregard for reality has only gotten worse since then.

1

u/Hamster_Splash Jul 09 '26

Might get nominated if he actually puts up a fight on this.

5

u/Yeahsoboutthat Jul 08 '26

I live in Kentucky. It won't flip. There are too many who will automatically elect all Republicans for all tickets. It's not because the policies of the left are against what they believe to be valuable or good for their community (except for the racists and anti-abortion folks, of which there are plenty here). It's because it's an US vs THEM mentality. And the US is the good guys. And the THEM is the bad guys.

And folks are able to overlook all the individuals that prove this wrong. 

3

u/ZacPensol Jul 08 '26

Kentuckian here: while we vote in democrat governors pretty frequently, the state is pretty deeply red throughout most of it, unfortunately. I love my home state, but the lack of education and critical thinking skills really shows when you interact with a lot of these folks - mostly good people who would give you the shirts off their back, but also completely oblivious when it comes to politics. I'm sure this is the case most places, but around here I deeply suspect that most of them have no idea what a senator or representative even does and will just vote with whichever is the republican option because that's what they were brought up being told to do.

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u/chiefboldface Jul 08 '26

Yes i do…..

15

u/I_eat_mud_ Jul 08 '26

They'll probably give the seat to fucking Massie anyways

21

u/Stranger-Sun Jul 08 '26

They passed a law to allow for that, but I read someone saying that it was against the Kentucky state constitution and hasn't been tried in court. Obviously that would take a LONG time to adjudicate if true.

24

u/Formal_Pockets Jul 08 '26

Better him than 99% of the Republicans who could get appointed to the seat.

In a perfect world, Beshear puts Charles Booker in the seat. But Andy is a savvy politician, he knows there are bigger fights.

8

u/I_eat_mud_ Jul 08 '26

Not really, like he's so apt to brag about, he still voted in line with Republicans like 93% of the time. He's trash just like MTG, and neither of them are smart enough to take ownership for how their actions got a pedophile in office in the first place.

Neither deserve to even go near politics anymore lmao

3

u/hexiron Jul 08 '26

He is a republican, so it's not surprising he typically votes in favor of conservative policies. The important bit is he doesn't suck Trumps toes like the rest of them and is more than willing to both stick to his promises and work with democrats on functional policy.

2

u/HauntedCemetery Minnesota Jul 08 '26

They don't, but fox will run emotional trigger programming for a couple days and suddenly they will have always cared, for a week or two.

1

u/Freakwilly Kentucky Jul 08 '26

Bullshit. We've been waiting for the turtle to move on for a long time.

1

u/burchalade Jul 08 '26

Yes we do. There are a lot of sane people here. We're just outnumbered.

1

u/Dirty_Old_Town Kentucky Jul 08 '26

I mean, a lot of us do. Just not a majority of voters, sadly.

2

u/coleto22 Jul 08 '26

On the other hand, the GOP majority is down by one vote.

2

u/Gil_Demoono Jul 08 '26

God I wish we would have the balls and break from procedure and decorum ONCE. Show up at the hospital, with cops, and demand the location of your elected official. Kentucky has a fucking right to know.

1

u/MrUsername0 Jul 08 '26

As long as tortoise-man is plugged in, they lose that senate vote. 

1

u/jerhinesmith Jul 08 '26

Force the GOP to respond

How?

1

u/Gurney_Hackman Jul 08 '26

Force the GOP to respond

How?

1

u/Thunderb1rd02 Jul 08 '26

How would that work? Can he just say we are having a special election?

I feel like there would have to be some official closure and not showing up for a month wouldn't cover it (With Aug 3rd being the deadline legally)

1

u/Former_Island_4730 Jul 08 '26 edited Jul 08 '26

Maybe those citizens in Kentucky shouldn’t have elected a 78 year old to a 6 year term? You get the representation you deserve, dum dums.

1

u/T8ert0t Jul 09 '26

Congress.

A guaranteed job you can literally fuck off, not be seen for weeks, and atrophy to absolute death, all before getting replaced or removed for incapacity.

Never let someone with a fake job tell how to spend money.

1

u/eeyore134 Jul 08 '26

Democrats don't make waves. They'll just sit back and wait. Taking the high road off a cliff wasn't enough, they're going to still try to hold their heads high as we plummet toward the ground. If this were reversed Republicans would have had the state guard raiding the hospital in full armor the night it happened.

1

u/Level21DungeonMaster Jul 08 '26

Kentucky sucks. Those evil pea brained idiots cursed the world with McConnell for decades.

Boycott Kentucky for equal time

1

u/mcampo84 Jul 08 '26

Why can't he swing on down to the hospital and see for himself?