Stacey Abrams lost two elections, but her career isn't over. It's just not at the ballots.
History says candidates who lose in consecutive elections rarely succeed in future attempts
Answer the following question in three seconds or less: What was the last elected office held by Stacey Abrams?
One … two … three.
The answer is Georgia House of Representatives member, a post that represents approximately 60,000 Georgians in a state with a population of more than 10 million. She held that seat from 2007 through 2017, when she resigned to run for governor – the first time.
She lost that election, shunned a run for U.S. Senate two years later, was passed over as a vice presidential running mate by Joe Biden that same year, and then lost another gubernatorial bid this year.
She hasn’t governed for five years and the next election is two years away – when the only state posts on the ballot are for Georgia General Assembly and the only federal positions up in Georgia are in the U.S. House. The presidential ticket will be part of 2024 as well, but she’s an even longer shot for that now than she was in 2020.
Abrams’ political career, at least as an elected official, is potentially over.
National media have penned odes that read like political obituaries in the days since her most recent loss. They talk about her legacy, framing her work to strengthen the Democratic electorate in Georgia in biblical terms – as Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt and to the Promised Land yet never set foot there himself, so did Abrams orchestrate the purpling of Georgia yet never held statewide office.
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The hyperbole is eye rolling, but the takeaway is accurate: Abrams did more to register, engage and mobilize Georgia’s politically apathetic through her New Georgia Project and Fair Fight than any activist in recent memory. That she couldn’t get them to the polls this cycle to vote for her is a puzzling reality, even as she faced a popular incumbent.
If not now, then when?
Why is it hard to recover from two election losses?
Abrams gave a fiery concession speech on Nov. 8, marked by this hint about her future plans: "While I may have not crossed the finish line, that doesn’t mean that I won’t stop running for a better Georgia."
History indicates her races will get progressively harder.
The data pros at FiveThirtyEight, a website that uses statistical analysis to tell stories about politics, sports, science and more, last year looked at the difficulties candidates face in winning elections after losing them. Their focus was on Beto O’Rourke, the Texas Democrat who lost his third statewide bid for office in four years in the Nov. 8 midterms.
The results cover Abrams’ situation as well: Of the 20 politicians to run for U.S. senator, governor or president after consecutive failed bids, only one won office. That winner, Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, needed a runoff to capture a Senate seat in 2016.
As David Barker, a professor of government at American University, told FiveThirtyEight, “The process of losing tends to label one a loser. You start to look like somebody who’s just so ambitious that you don’t care about anything else … and you start to look like a little bit of a fool.”
Ouch.
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Abrams is anything but a fool, and her early concession on election night and avoidance of the public eye since delivering that speech shows an understanding of the professor’s point. She’ll reappear soon, what with fellow Democrat Raphael Warnock campaigning in the U.S. Senate runoff.
But unlike a certain other election loser, Abrams will keep the focus on Warnock and the runoff’s ramifications and not about herself and any personal grievances.
To lead government, work in government
Come Dec. 6, Abrams will need to figure out what’s next. If she wants to run for office again, she might consider working in government in the meantime.
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She’s only 48 years old and remains a popular figure nationally among Democrats. The federal government has many high-profile appointed positions in the executive branch, and she holds a law degree from an Ivy League school, which is a litmus test for a judgeship.
There’s a path forward for her political career. It just no longer leads to an election ballot.
Adam Van Brimmer is the opinion editor for the Savannah Morning News, where this column originally ran. Contact Van Brimmer avanbrimmer@savannahnow.com and via Twitter @SavannahOpinion