Stacey Abrams isn't the future of the Democratic Party. She's the present.

By James Hohmann
January 30 at 8:49 AM

THE BIG IDEA: Two long years ago, Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi tapped former Kentucky governor Steve Beshear to deliver their party’s response to President Trump’s first State of the Union address. He was a 72-year-old white male moderate from a small town at a moment when Democrats were fixated on how they got whupped so badly in rural areas. Bill Clinton carried the Bluegrass State in 1996, but Hillary Clinton garnered less than 33 percent of the vote two decades later. Seated at a table in an old-fashioned diner, Beshear opened with a gaffe. “I’m a proud Democrat, but first and foremost, I’m a proud Republican, and Democrat, and mostly, American,” he said.

Chuck and Nancy have picked another Southerner to deliver the 2019 response, but she’s different in almost every way. And that reflects the mood of the moment in Democratic politics. Stacey Abrams, 45, last year became the first black woman ever nominated by a major party for governor. The former minority leader in the Georgia state House is unapologetically liberal, even though she’s from a red state. While Beshear went to a state school, Abrams earned her law degree from Yale. Beshear has been married for 50 years and has two grown kids; Abrams, who is single, has never been married and has no children. He’s mild-mannered; she’s fiery.

“I plan to deliver a vision for prosperity and equality, where everyone in our nation has a voice and where each of those voices is heard,” Abrams said in a statement.

-- The shift from Steve to Stacey, with Joe Kennedy III in between, is a nod by party chieftains to what they perceive as growing grass-roots hunger for fresh faces of color who are young and female.

“We were sitting around thinking about this three weeks ago, and her name came up. Immediately, everyone in the room said, ‘Let’s do it,’” Schumer (D-N.Y.) told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “She’s an amazing person with an amazing story.”

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