Who’s surprised? Stacey Abrams, who was highly anticipated to be Georgia’s next governor and the first Black female governor in the United States, is the most-Googled politician of 2018.
Of course, Abrams “lost” the election against former Secretary of State and current Gov. Elect Brian Kemp, in a contentious election that has been rife with accusations of voter suppression.
According to The Hill, it was around mid-October through mid-November, when the accusations against Kemp started to gain fire that search results for Abrams truly skyrocketed.
As Secretary of State, Kemp’s office was in charge of the electoral process in the state, as well as voter registration. Instead of stepping down from his position for the election process, Kemp maintained his position and his office was accused of varying degrees of voter suppression.
First came the revelation that his office was sitting on over 53,000 voter registrations that were stalled (70 percent of the registrations belonged to black voters) due to the state’s “exact match” registration verification process.
Then, the office was accused of removing some 107,000 people from voting rolls in Georgia for failing to vote in the previous elections, through the state’s “use it or lose it” policy.
Then, came the audio where Kemp actually voiced concerns about Georgians voting in elections, something they are supposed to do, or you know, they lose that right.
Along the way, Abrams has fought Kemp and his tactics, repeatedly calling him “an architect of suppression,” and initially refusing to concede the Governor’s race, calling on every vote to be counted.
In the end, she did not even really concede, noting in a speech following the elections, “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.”
Throughout the entire process, Kemp has routinely denied any mismanagement of the elections and dismissed accusations of suppression.
In Google’s “Year in Search,” Abrams beat out many hot-button politicians including Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas) who was in another fiercely contested battle against Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Cruz himself, Florida’s Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum and Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) the youngest member of Congress.
