On Nov. 5 Andy Beshear, the Attorney General of Kentucky, was elected as the state’s 63rd Governor over incumbent Matt Bevin. Beshear is a Democrat. Kentucky is one of the most Republican states in the nation and one of the most ardently pro-Trump states, swinging wildly away from the Democrats in 2016 towards Donald Trump.  

With such a wild swing from a 30 point Trump victory to a one point Beshear victory, there has been an inclination by many to say that this is evidence of Trump’s base turning on him, finally seeing the lies he has sowed, but that is far from the case. While it is absolutely absurd to claim that Trump’s visit the day before swung the results from a 20 point blowout to a narrow loss, as the president himself and the Chair of the Republican National Committee did, it is as absurd to claim that Trump is the reason Bevin lost. There was a whole symphony of disasters that won Beshear the election. 

Bevin had dug his own grave. His personal political style, which can only be described as mean, turned a large swath of people off to the governor initially as he used insults to try and destroy his political opponents. By the time the primary election had come, he was so unpopular within his own party that a no-name State Representative nearly defeated him for the Republican nomination.  

Bevin also had wildly unpopular policy goals as well, with a plan to gut the popular Kentucky Medicaid expansion and implement work requirements on Medicaid, potentially taking care away from 100,000 individuals.  

He then picked a fight with teachers over budget cuts, pay and supplies, prompting the teachers to lead a sickout strike to force him to reverse his decision. After this Bevin began abusing teachers, calling them “molesters.” This attack on teachers energized the union to actively work to defeat him, with some 1,000 teachers volunteering for Beshear’s campaign against Bevin. 

On top of this, Beshear is a masterful politician. If you cannot tell, Bevin is an idiot. Beshear recognized where he needed to win and picked up endorsements in those areas. In the coalfields of the eastern part of the state, he was endorsed by state house minority leader Rocky Adkins, who won him thousands of votes from conservative coal miners. In Louisville, he picked up major endorsements to drive out turnout in the somewhat moderate county.  

That’s the ballgame; that’s why a mainstream Democrat won in Kentucky. Donald Trump didn’t matter. The reason the Democrat won was because the Republican nominee was an adversarial imbecile and the Democratic nominee was a competent, unifying figure.