In 2018, Abrams became the first black woman to receive a major party nomination for governor in any state. Her loss by about 55,000 votes to Republican Brian Kemp led to a lawsuit against the state alleging an unfair election, as Kemp oversaw the election in his former role as Georgia’s secretary of state.

…I think there are two pieces to focus on. One is ensuring that voter suppression does not have its intended effect, which is by making it more difficult to vote, people decide not to bother trying. Our goal through Fair Fight and Fair Fight 2020 is to ensure that people know about the obstacles that are being placed in their way, but (are encouraged to) vote in even larger numbers to overwhelm the intention of the system. The best way to defeat voter suppression is by having such a high turnout that the barriers to voting have limited effect. 

…What tends to happen is that in election years featuring a presidential candidate, we only pay attention to the top of the ticket. But we know that if you care about criminal justice reform, you need to pay attention to district attorney races and to judicial races, because the people who decide how our community is treated in the court system get elected in that year.  And we need to ensure that if someone is running for the school board, if they’re making a decision over hundreds of millions of dollars that will be allocated to the benefit or to the detriment of our children, that we know who they are and we hold them accountable. 

Stacey Abrams’ message to black voters: Be heard and counted in 2020

hmmm