
Fancy Farm Highlights
Clip: Season 3 Episode 46 | 8m 41sVideo has Closed Captions
Recap of the 2024 Fancy Farm Picnic.
The Fancy Farm Picnic, the Olympics of Kentucky politics, happened this Saturday and we have all the highlights.
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Kentucky Edition is a local public television program presented by KET

Fancy Farm Highlights
Clip: Season 3 Episode 46 | 8m 41sVideo has Closed Captions
The Fancy Farm Picnic, the Olympics of Kentucky politics, happened this Saturday and we have all the highlights.
Problems playing video? | Closed Captioning Feedback
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Politics happened this past Saturday.
Kate was on site the whole day.
So you did not miss a beat if you watched and if you did miss our coverage this weekend.
Well, our Toby Gibbs has a recap for you.
From roasted barbecue to the roasted politicians.
At Saint Jerome's annual Fancy Farm Church picnic, you'll hear the familiar sounds of summer.
I heard an organ.
Mutton barbecue are the delicacies.
Bingo is more of a sport than a game.
And sun drop is the drink of choice.
But in the midst of the summertime revelry, you'll also find one of the Commonwealth's oldest political traditions, the fancy farm speeches.
It's a rare moment when political royalty mixes with the general electorate a grass roots moment for politicians to connect with the voters.
Speakers carefully crafted presentation takes aim at the opposite political party with jokes and jabs sprinkled throughout.
Every year, the fancy farm speeches are moderated by a popular, prominent or powerful Kentuckian.
This year, that honor went to Father Jim Ciccio, a Catholic priest from Lexington.
He started the afternoon off with some jokes aimed at both parties.
Senator McConnell has been in politics so long.
His first campaign was to help Moses get the Ten Commandments.
Signed into law.
Moses, the only other.
Man to lead a group of men and women in the desert longer than he.
Next, I want to highlight Governor Beshear.
Governor, you two are in right here.
Oh.
Sorry.
He's not here.
Scratch that.
Beshear has only attended a single fancy farm picnics since becoming governor almost five years ago, and he didn't give a reason for his absence this year.
Many speculate he was meeting with Kamala Harris, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, making his case to be her V.P.
pick.
When it was McConnell's turn to speak, he was met with loud protests from activists calling for a cease fire in the Middle East.
Still, he touted his record over Bashir and Harris.
Governor Bashir said she'd be a phenomenal president.
I guess that does it for us.
For a guy used to having jobs served up to him on a silver platter.
What we need to remember about politics is all like cooking.
When you get a bad recipe, you get a bad meal.
Tamil The recipe is simple.
Three things involved with her campaign Chaos and crisis and in confidence.
Kentucky's first Congressional District, which encompasses Western Kentucky and Fancy Farm, had both candidates in attendance.
Erin Marshall is the Democratic challenger to Republican incumbent James Colmer.
I am running to continue the work that we have worked to put in over the past years with Governor Beshear.
It is time to bring back more jobs to the district, support our farmers, revitalize our small town and protect a woman's right to make her own health care choices.
You see, Jamie Coleman has an A-plus rating from anti-choice organizations.
For a party and for a man that professes to love small government so much, he sure loves to be in our business.
Speaking of Maine, he they say he isn't here today because he's applying for another job.
He wants to be vice president so.
Bad that when Kamala has asked him what his pronouns were and.
He replied.
Pretty and please.
Desperate to reinvent him, his image from a wimpy.
Choirboy to a liberal attack dog.
And he went on national TV to attack J.D.
Vance for not being like most Kentuckians.
I mean, J.D.
Vance grew up in East Kentucky.
In a broken home to a working class mother battling addiction.
At the same time, 80 mature was roughing it growing up in the lieutenant governor's mansion.
With it being a presidential election year.
Speeches quickly took on a national political tone with issues like immigration making their way to the forefront a familiar face to many Kentuckians.
Former Attorney General Daniel Cameron spoke on behalf of the Trump campaign.
We've got to save ourselves from the Harris Biden agenda.
And it's only fair that I put the vice president's name first.
If she's going to boot Biden from the ticket and then take the Democratic Party's nomination, then she has to own that disastrous record.
She gets to own record high inflation.
That's created hardship and excited for millions of working families.
The Harris campaign did not send a surrogate to speak.
The Libertarian Party did.
They sent their party's candidate, Chase Oliver, to address the crowd at Fancy Farm.
In a twist of tradition this year, Fancy Farm invited speakers on either side of the aisle to stump for and against constitutional amendment number two, which will be on the ballot in November.
If passed, the amendment would allow the legislature to direct public money to private schools.
Democratic Representative Sherrod Stevenson, the minority caucus chair in the state House, pulled no punches.
She says Amendment two is a bad idea.
As a first time speaker.
You could say I'm more excited than a Republican trying to take away your lunch break.
I am more ready to go to Matt Bevin's ex-wife.
It was Matt Bevin who gave us the sewer bill, and vouchers stink just as much.
Vouchers are just the latest example of Republicans trying to shove their unpopular and unconstitutional schemes down Kentuckians throats.
They will dry up our public schools budgets, and they were shuttered their doors.
But hey, that's okay.
If you ask the super majority, that's just more kids to put out on the job side.
Republican Representative Suzanne Miles, Majority caucus chair in the state House, says what we've been doing isn't working.
It's time to try something new.
Half of.
Our kids in the state of Kentucky.
Cannot breathe at grade level.
That's an embarrassment and embarrassment.
A third of whom are not proficient in math.
Now, we have done all together over record funding, even in count inflation.
$17,000 over $17,000 for every single child in the system.
And you know what?
That's got us 38th in the nation.
That is so embarrassing.
To wrap up the political portion of the 2020 for a fancy farm picnic.
Most of Kentucky's constitutional officers took their turn at the podium to point to national politics, touting Trump and taunting Harris.
Republicans kept alluding to their party as a big tent, offering supporters of different demographics a place to call home.
The state of Kentucky and the speaking stage at Fancy Farm used to be overwhelmingly blue.
But that's no longer the case.
The voter makeup of Kentucky has changed.
Registered Republicans now outnumber registered Democrats, and that's clear from the partizan balance at this year's fancy farm.
Only two Democrats made it to the podium after all the jeers, jabs, roasts and digs from Saturday's speeches.
The best way to celebrate a favorite candidate might have been with a barbecue sandwich, a sun drop and a seat at the bingo table.
For Kentucky Edition, I'm Toby Gibbs.
Thank you so much, Toby.
Son, drop in barbecue, that's for sure.
You can see all of the fancy farm political speeches in their entirety online on demand at Katie dot org.
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