Following her narrow loss to Republican Brian Kemp in the 2018 race to be Georgia’s governor, Stacey Abrams is remaining on the national political scene. Now, she’s got a national organization called Fair Fight 2020 ready to help Democrats across the country start shoring up their voter protection programs right away. During an appearance on this Monday’s edition of CBS This Morning, she passionately denounced Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel after McDaniel criticized her for not offering a public concession of the Georgia’s governor’s race while this new effort unfolded. According to Abrams, she will not be giving any concession anytime soon because to do so would be more acceptance of the deeply flawed system than she’s willing to put out.
She explained:
‘Concession means to say that the process was fair, but when I run an organization that in 10 days between election night and the night I refuse to concede we receive more than 50,000 phone calls of people who were denied the right to vote — I am complicit if I say that that system is fair.’
Watch:
Why haven’t you conceded?
“Because concession means to say that the process was fair… I am complicit if I say that that system is fair.” — @staceyabrams pic.twitter.com/vfvrRkyvHN
— CBS This Morning (@CBSThisMorning) August 19, 2019
Fair Fight 2020 emerged following Abrams founding a similar statewide initiative within Georgia, a version of which she also ran in cooperation with the Democratic Party itself ahead of the 2018 elections.
In response to these developments, McDaniel had complained, packing in lies for good measure or something:
‘If Stacey Abrams actually cared about the integrity of elections, she would concede the Georgia governor’s race that she lost by 55,000 votes. Instead, she’s on national TV today still thinking she won. Completely ridiculous.’
Abrams is not presenting herself as “thinking she won.” As she went on to explain, she’s well aware of and open about the fact that the election duly proceeded in a technically legal manner. The problem is with how it got there, leaving out large numbers of voters along the way such as those removed from records for not recently casting ballots and whose local polling stations were closed.
Abrams insisted, loud and clear for all who would listen:
‘I did not deny the legal sufficiency of the election. I am not claiming to be the governor of Georgia, despite what Breitbart and others like to say… You can have higher turnout, but that doesn’t diminish the fact that voter suppression is real and affecting people across the country.’
Issues with voter suppression extend well beyond a few isolated incidents like ballot counting irregularities and polling place closures in Georgia. In state after state, Republican leaders have attempted purges of voter rolls, trying to remove names from voter records for a variety of reasons, including trumped up questions about the voters’ immigration status. Texas Secretary of State David Whitley resigned earlier this year after he led an effort to vet the immigration status of tens of thousands of apparently recently naturalized immigrants that fell apart under a torrent of criticism.
To address issues like this one, Fair Fight 2020 is dispatching to a variety of states around the country, including a few where there are governor’s races this upcoming year. They’ve already gotten their operation going.
Featured Image via screenshot
