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Stacey Abrams Ends Her Campaign But Won’t Concede

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Democrat Stacey Abrams ended her campaign for Georgia governor on Friday, criticizing her opponent, Brian Kemp, for his role in “suppression of the people’s democratic right to vote.”

She called Kemp’s behavior “appalling” and explained that she was ending her campaign, but she was not conceding. Had she won, Abrams would have been Georgia’s first female governor and the country’s first African American to hold the highest seat in a state.

“So, let’s be clear. This is not a speech of concession. Because concession means to acknowledge an action is right, true or proper. As a woman of conscience and faith, I cannot concede that. But my assessment is the law currently allows no further viable remedy.”

“I will not concede because the erosion of our democracy is not right,” Abrams added. She plans to launch a voting rights group to file “major” litigation challenging election policies in Georgia.

Brian Kemp Georgia

President Donald Trump congratulated Kemp on Twitter while also praising Abrams:

“Congratulations to Brian Kemp on becoming the new Governor of Georgia,” Trump tweeted. “Stacey Abrams fought brilliantly and hard – she will have a terrific political future! Brian was unrelenting and will become a great Governor for the truly Wonderful People of Georgia!”

In an affidavit filed in Federal District Court in Atlanta, investigative journalist Greg Palast provided the court on Thursday with the information that a team of experts has the names and addresses of 340,134 voters wrongly purged from Georgia voter rolls without notice by Kemp in 2016 and 2017 while he was Secretary of State and preparing his run for governor.

Palast stated in his affidavit, “From my 18 years of experience in investigating voter purges nationwide, and from what I witnessed on Election Day in Georgia, there can be no doubt that the extraordinarily massive and wrongful purge by cancellation of voters is a major cause of the spike in provisional ballots and Election Day polling place chaos.”

Abrams acknowledges that she could continue litigation, but she prefers a respectable win. “Now, I could certainly bring a new case to keep this one contest alive, but I don’t want to hold public office if I need to scheme my way into the post,” she said.” Because the title of governor isn’t nearly as important as our shared title: voters.”

2 Comments

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