If you drew up a list of the two dozen people most likely to become the 48th president of the United States, Gov. Brian Kemp’s name would probably be on it.
So, halfway through his second and final term as governor, Kemp has decisions to make about his political future. And while the man in the Governor’s Mansion knows things that the rest of us cannot, from polling data and donor lists to his own mindset, there is also much that nobody knows.
Let’s join the governor in thinking through the possibilities.
Before 2028, there is 2026, when Kemp’s term as governor will end, as will Jon Ossoff’s term as U.S. senator. If Kemp chooses to challenge Ossoff, he can do so knowing that no Republican of significance is likely to challenge him for the nomination. Given the current political climate in Georgia, he also knows he would probably be the favorite against Ossoff in the general election.
But ….
Historically, mid-term elections favor the party that is out of power, which in this case would be Ossoff and the Democrats. Furthermore, anyone who claims to know what the political climate will be in 2026 is a fool or thinks his audience is. That’s true in almost any era, but it’s particularly true today. These next two years could prove to be one of the most volatile, unpredictable periods in American political history.
Old coalitions are crumbling; new alliances are quietly forming. Longtime Republicans are voting for Democrats, traditional Democrats are voting for Republicans, and an influx of new voters has altered the electorate, injecting new enthusiasms and expectations.
In fact, to hear some Republican activists talk, we might be about to enter something akin to the second American Revolution, a revolution that sounds as if it might resemble the chaotic, destructive French Revolution more than the revolution of 1776. Donald Trump and his supporters proclaim grand ambitions to root out the entire establishment, and to date they don’t seem shy about breaking norms, rules and even laws if that’s what it takes to make their mission successful.
These people are not conservative in any real sense of the word, they are radical. They are intent on pushing boundaries, on finding out just how much they can get away with, and no one knows how the country as a whole is likely to respond to that attempt.
It’s possible that two years from now, Trump and his supporters will be riding high, having squelched their opposition and looking to consolidate control over the country. If that’s the situation, Kemp’s Senate candidacy would look even more promising than it does today.
However, if these next two years do not go well, if Republicans prove unable or unwilling to govern, if they turn out to be quite good at destroying things but terrible at running or rebuilding them, the political climate for Kemp and other Republicans might look quite different. Under those circumstances, why would Kemp risk a defeat in 2026 that would end his presidential ambitions for 2028?
It also raises a larger question: Does Kemp need or even want a Senate seat?
Assuming that he truly does have presidential ambitions, Kemp might decide that he’s better off campaigning in Iowa and New Hampshire as a successful two-term former governor of a critical swing state, a man who is conservative but not crazy, than he would be as a sitting U.S. senator, with the taint of Washington on his clothes.
To add yet one more complication to an already complex matrix, a four-year Trump presidency that appears successful to voters – and heaven knows what that would look like – would probably push Kemp well down the list of potential 2028 contenders. In that circumstance, the GOP presidential nomination would probably go to someone deemed more loyal and frankly more subservient to Trump, with Vice President J.D. Vance leading the list. To a degree at least, Kemp’s ambitions depend upon Trump’s failures.
Again, these are all just possibilities to be weighed, plausibilities to be played out, perhaps in the mind of someone staring out a window at the terraced, late-fall landscaping at the Governor’s Mansion, someone perhaps wondering what the view might look like from a window at another executive mansion some 600 miles to the northeast.
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