Kentucky Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear railed against the acrimony of national politics Wednesday night as he called for a commonsense approach to governing that meets the everyday needs of families worried about access to affordable health care and the availability of good-paying jobs.
Beshear, who has raised his national profile since winning reelection in 2023 in the GOP-dominated state, touted Kentucky's record-setting pace of economic development and infrastructure improvements resulting in better roads, cleaner water and expanded access to high-speed internet. Those achievements were the result of “pushing out that national noise” and finding common ground, he said.
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Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
The governor's most pointed comments were aimed at the national political discourse as he delivered his annual State of the Commonwealth speech at the Kentucky Capitol in Frankfort.
“Yes, there are a lot of big, important issues facing our country,” Beshear said. “But if you're staring at the cost of your child’s prescription and wondering how you're going to pay for both it and your family’s dinner, the offense of the day in Washington just doesn’t seem that important.”
Continuing one of his favorite themes, Beshear said that most Americans aren't thinking about politics at the start of every day. Instead, he said, they wake up thinking about their jobs, their children's education, their family's next doctor's appointment and the safety of their communities.
“We must stay laser-focused on creating better jobs, more affordable and accessible health care, safer roads and bridges, and the very best education for our children,” Beshear said. "Let’s continue to make sure our communities are places where our people aren’t just safer but also feel safer.
“Let’s let our positive actions speak louder than the nasty words we hear on TV or that we read online," he said. "And we can do this simply by focusing on the core areas where we can and we should find common ground.”
During his first term, Beshear mostly avoided criticizing Donald Trump, not wanting to rile Bluegrass State voters who overwhelmingly support the former president who is now headed back to the White House. Beshear took a more aggressive tone against Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance last year while unsuccessfully vying for his party’s vice presidential nod and then as a campaign surrogate for the Democratic ticket.
Beshear, who is term-limited, has had a strained relationship with the GOP-led legislature at times, and there were plenty of empty seats in the House chamber for his speech. Republican lawmakers say Beshear has taken credit for economic development successes that they say are the result of business-friendly policies passed by the legislature, sometimes over Beshear's opposition.
“Probably the governor's single-largest legislative accomplishment has been the fact that we override his vetoes,” Kentucky House Speaker David Osborne, a Republican, said in an interview on Kentucky Educational Television after Beshear's speech.
In his remarks, the governor continued pushing for state-funded preschool for every 4-year-old in Kentucky — a proposal that has made no headway in the legislature.
“Pre-K provides proven, lifelong gains,” Beshear said. “And right now, folks, we're failing our kids. More than half of Kentucky's kids – 54% – are showing up for kindergarten unprepared.”
In a speech that largely focused on reaching across the political divide, Beshear called on Republicans to accept the results of a pivotal school-choice measure on the statewide ballot last November. Kentucky voters soundly rejected the measure, which would have allowed lawmakers to allocate public tax dollars to support students attending private or charter schools. Beshear led opposition to the measure.
The message from voters was clear. “Public dollars are for public schools," Beshear said Wednesday evening. He urged lawmakers to "stop the voucher nonsense. Let’s stop the end-run through tax shelters. Instead, let’s roll up our sleeves and let's do the hard work to strengthen and improve our public schools.”
The speech comes as Beshear's national profile has continued to grow. Democratic governors recently picked Beshear as chair-elect of the Democratic Governors Association for 2026, meaning he will take a lead role in his party's efforts to win governorships in the midterm election, including a crucial set of presidential swing states.
Beshear accepted an invitation to speak at the upcoming World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, a global event that brings together business, government and academic leaders. Beshear has said it’s an opportunity to promote Kentucky on the global stage. It also could boost his reputation as his name comes up amid early speculation about potential Democratic contenders for the White House in 2028.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear gives his State of The Commonwealth address in the House chamber at the Kentucky State Capitol in Frankfort, Ky., Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025. (AP Photo/Timothy D. Easley)
BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s parliament voted Thursday to elect army commander Joseph Aoun as head of state, filling a more than two-year-long presidential vacuum.
The vote came weeks after a tenuous ceasefire agreement halted a 14-month conflict between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and at a time when Lebanon’s leaders are seeking international assistance for reconstruction.
Aoun, no relation to former president Michel Aoun, was widely seen as the preferred candidate of the United States and Saudi Arabia, whose assistance Lebanon will need as it seeks to rebuild.
The session was the legislature’s 13th attempt to elect a successor to Michel Aoun, whose term ended in October 2022.
Hezbollah previously backed another candidate, Suleiman Frangieh, the leader of a small Christian party in northern Lebanon with close ties to former Syrian President Bashar Assad. However, on Wednesday, Frangieh announced he had withdrawn from the race and endorsed Aoun, clearing the way for the army chief.
Randa Slim, a senior fellow at the Washington, D.C.-based Middle East Institute, said that the military and political weakening of Hezbollah following its war with Israel and the fall of its ally, Assad, in Syria, along with international pressure to elect a president paved the way for Thursday’s result.
In a first round of voting Thursday, Aoun received 71 out of 128 votes but fell short of the two-thirds majority needed to win outright. Of the rest, 37 lawmakers cast blank ballots and 14 voted for “sovereignty and the constitution.”
In the second round, he received 99 votes.
The head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, Mohammed Raad, implied that the group's legislators had withheld their votes from Aoun in the first round but voted for him in the second in bid to show that Hezbollah - even in its diminished state - cannot be politically sidelined.
“We postponed our vote because we wanted to send a message that just as we are protectors of Lebanon’s sovereignty, we are protectors of the national accord," Raad said after the election.
Aoun was escorted by a marching band into the parliament building in downtown Beirut where he took the oath of office.
Some streets erupted in celebratory fireworks and gunshots. In Aoun’s hometown of Aichiye in Jezzine province, southern Lebanon, people waved the Lebanese flag and distributed traditional sweets, while local media showed the slaughter of a sheep in celebration.
In a speech to parliament, Aoun pledged to carry out reforms to the judicial system, fight corruption and work to consolidate the state’s right to “monopolise the carrying of weapons,” in an apparent allusion to the arms of Hezbollah.
He also promised to control the country’s borders and “ensure the activation of the security services and to discuss a strategic defense policy that will enable the Lebanese state to remove the Israeli occupation from all Lebanese territories” in southern Lebanon, where the Israeli military has not yet withdrawn from dozens of villages.
He also vowed to reconstruct “what the Israeli army destroyed in the south, east and (Beirut’s southern) suburbs.”
Lebanon’s fractious sectarian power-sharing system is prone to deadlock, both for political and procedural reasons. The small, crisis-battered Mediterranean country has been through several extended presidential vacancies, with the longest lasting nearly 2 1/2 years between May 2014 and October 2016. It ended when former President Michel Aoun was elected.
The president's role in Lebanon is limited under the power-sharing system in which the president is always a Maronite Christian, the prime minister a Sunni Muslim and the speaker of parliament Shiite.
However, only the president has the power to appoint or remove a prime minister and cabinet. The caretaker government that has run Lebanon for the last two years has reduced powers because it was not appointed by a sitting president.
Joseph Aoun is the fifth former army commander to ascend to Lebanon’s presidency, despite the fact that the country's constitution prohibits high-ranking public servants, including army commanders, from assuming the presidency during their term or within two years of stepping down.
Under normal circumstances, a presidential candidate in Lebanon can be elected by a two-thirds majority of the 128-member house in the first round of voting, or by a simple majority in a subsequent round.
But because of the constitutional issues surrounding his election, Aoun needed a two-thirds majority in the second round to clinch the election.
Aoun, 60, was appointed army chief in March 2017 and had been set to retire in January 2024, but his term was extended twice during the Israel-Hezbollah conflict. He kept a low profile and avoided media appearances and never formally announced his candidacy.
Other contenders included Jihad Azour, a former finance minister who is now the director of the Middle East and Central Asia Department at the International Monetary Fund; and Elias al-Baysari, the acting head of Lebanon’s General Security agency. Al-Baisary announced Thursday that he was pulling out of the race.
The next government will face daunting challenges apart from implementing the ceasefire agreement that ended the Israel-Hezbollah war and seeking funds for reconstruction.
Lebanon is in its sixth year of an economic and financial crisis that decimated the country's currency and wiped out the savings of many Lebanese. The cash-strapped state electricity company provides only a few hours of power a day.
The country's leaders reached a preliminary agreement with the IMF for a bail-out package in 2022 but have made limited progress on reforms required to clinch the deal.
Slim, the analyst, said that “the fact that (Aoun) has the backing of Saudi Arabia, the U.S. and the Europeans give him a big boost in terms of being able to get things done,” Slim said.
But he will still have to “navigate the contradiction that are inherent in domestic Lebanese politics,” she said, including relations with Hezbollah, which is not only a militant group but a political party with a strong base of support.
Aoun “has never had a conflictual relationship with Hezbollah, but he has also never acquiesced to Hezbollah,” Slim said.
The army commander’s relative lack of experience with economic matters means he will likely lean heavily on his advisors.
Newly-elected Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, center, smiles and waves to journalists upon his arrival at the Lebanese Parliament to be sworn in as a new president, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Newly-elected Lebanese President Joseph Aoun addresses his first speech at the Lebanese Parliament after being sworn in as a new president, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Newly-elected Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, center, reviews the honor guard upon his arrival at the Lebanese Parliament to be sworn in as a new president, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Newly-elected Lebanese President Joseph Aoun reviews the honor guard upon his arrival at the Lebanese Parliament to be sworn in as a new president, in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A Lebanese lawmaker casts his vote to elect a new president, at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Hezbollah's parliamentary bloc members attend a parliamentary session to elect a new president, at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, right, casts his vote to elect a new president, at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (Lebanese Parliament media office via AP)
Lebanese lawmakers count the votes after casting their ballots to elect a new president, at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Lebanese army soldiers block a road that leads to the parliament building while lawmakers gather to elect a president in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese army soldiers block a road that leads to the parliament building while lawmakers gather to elect a president in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese army soldiers stand guard in front of the parliament building before a session to elect a new Lebanese president in down town Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri opens the session to elect a new president at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
A Lebanese army soldier with a sniffer dog checks a road that leads to the parliament building while lawmakers gather to elect a president in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese troops stand guard in front of the parliament building before a session to elect a new Lebanese president in down town Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Lebanese army soldiers block a road that leads to the parliament building while lawmakers gather to elect a president in Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)
Lebanese lawmakers gather to elect a new president at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
Lebanese lawmakers gather to elect a new president at the parliament building in downtown Beirut, Lebanon, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)
FILE - Lebanese Army Commander Gen. Joseph Aoun arrives for a meeting with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, at the government palace in Beirut, Lebanon, Dec. 16, 2024. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein, File)
FILE - In this photo released by the Lebanese Parliament media office, Lebanese lawmakers attending a parliament session, in Beirut, Lebanon, April 18, 2023. (Hassan Ibrahim/Lebanese Parliament media office via AP, File)
