Governor Kemp discloses very personal information for the first time during debate with Stacey Abrams on abortion

(AP Photos/John Amis, File)

Abortion is a hot button issue for both parties and Democrats have tried their best to make it the key issue in their campaigns this midterm election cycle. In the second and final debate between Republican incumbent Governor Brian Kemp and his Democrat challenger, Stacey Abrams in Georgia, Governor Kemp revealed for the first time publicly that his wife had a miscarriage early in their marriage. This information came during an extended back and forth between the two candidates on abortion.

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Democrats have little to run on and Joe Biden is extremely unpopular. He is as unpopular in Georgia as he is in the rest of the country. If someone asked if voters are better off now than they were two years ago, the answer would be no. Joe Biden’s recklessly progressive policies have created a rate of inflation not seen in 40 years, the end of our energy independence, a porous southern border that has allowed millions of illegal immigrants to cross into border states and a fentanyl epidemic to kill Americans in numbers never seen before, and a spike in violent crime in cities across the country. Democrats chose to run on the Supreme Court’s decision in the Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health case and on the January 6 hearings instead of issues that are of concern to every voter – the economy and public safety.

In 2019, Governor Kemp signed a law that bans most abortions in Georgia after fetal cardiac activity is detected. That is usually about six weeks into a pregnancy. Many women don’t realize they are pregnant before six weeks so fetal heartbeat bills have been controversial from the start. In their first debate at the Atlanta Press Club earlier this month, Kemp said he would not support any new restrictions, including fertility treatments or birth control. During the second debate on Sunday, Kemp refused to specifically say if he would sign new limits into law and Abrams jumped on that. And, she took the opportunity to bring GOP candidate for the Senate, Herschel Walker, into the discussion.

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“I’m not going to say yes or no to any specific piece of legislation,” when pressed by Richard Elliot, a Channel 2 reporter serving as a panelist. He added that he won’t pursue any new restrictions as part of his agenda.

“It’s not my desire to move the needle any further on this issue,” Kemp said. “We’ve been dealing with this issue for three years.”

Abrams immediately noted Kemp “did not say he wouldn’t.” And she quickly tried to tie Kemp to Republican Senate hopeful Herschel Walker, who is accused by two ex-girlfriends of pressuring them to get abortions despite his opposition to the procedure. Walker has denied their claims.

“He refuses to protect us. He refuses to defend us,” Abrams said of Kemp. “And yet he defended Herschel Walker, saying that he didn’t want to be involved in the personal life of his running mate.”

The Georgia abortion law does not penalize women for having a miscarriage. Democrats are using scare tactics by saying the statute opens the door to police investigating women to determine if a pregnancy was lost due to miscarriage or as a result of an abortion. Kemp spoke of his wife Marty’s miscarriage for the first time during the debate.

“I have been in the doctor’s office with my wife and seen two heartbeats on ultrasound. I’ve gone back a week or so later and saw one heartbeat,” Kemp said. “My wife and I both had a hard time having our first child. She miscarried.” He called miscarriage “a tragic, tragic, traumatic situation.”

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Kemp turned the tables on Abrams, though, to point out her own problems with expressing her stance on abortion. She has refused to say if she supports any restrictions at all on abortion.

After initially refusing to outline her position, she told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in June that she would set that mark when a “physician determines the fetus is viable outside of the body, except in the case of protecting the woman’s life or health.” At the debate, she tried to clarify her stance.

It’s a “decision that should be made between a doctor and a woman — as a medical choice,” she said, adding: “It is willful ignorance or misleading lies that change what I’ve said. But what I’ve also always said is that there should not be arbitrary timelines set by men who do not understand biology.”

Wasn’t it a woman nominated to the Supreme Court by Joe Biden that couldn’t provide senators on the Judiciary Committee with a definition of a woman? Trashing men for not understanding biology seems like a lame argument. Democrats are tied up in knots over the abortion issue.

Abrams went on to call Kemp’s story about miscarriage as “political fodder.”

In response to the governor’s revelation, Abrams said, “The tragic stories of miscarriage should not be political fodder, but they should also not be fodder for investigations. And the problem with this bill is it does not discern the difference.”

We are eight days out from election day. On November 8, a red wave is expected to crash over the Democrat Party and sweep in a Republican majority in the House and likely the Senate, too. While midterm elections are always a referendum on the president and his party experiences losses in the election, this year Democrats will be held accountable for the series of crises Joe Biden has mismanaged. The latest CBS poll shows that eight in 10 likely voters describe things in the country today as “out of control,” as opposed to “under control.” That is very bad news for Democrats. Abrams has failed to lock up the support of the Democrat base in Georgia while Governor Kemp is polling over 50% now, which means he will likely win this race without the need for a run-off. Democrats failed spectacularly to read the room in this election cycle and now they will pay for it.

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Ed Morrissey 10:00 PM | November 22, 2024
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