Time now for a midweek check in on some major political news so far this week with Rylan Barton, managing editor of Kentucky Public Radio.

Always good to see you.

Good to see to Renee.

So we're just, what, 20 days away or so from the November 7th election and the candidates and the governors race are really making their rounds with these joint appearances, forums and debates.

And the one they had Monday night got intense, shall we say, at times.

What did you take away from that appearance?

Yeah, a few takeaways.

One, Cameron continues to lean into the you know, trying to nationalize the race, tying Governor Beshear to President Joe Biden, who's very unpopular in Kentucky.

I think there was a poll that came out recently last week that showed a Biden something like a 28% approval rating here.

Meanwhile, this year continues to have a very high approval rating among likely voters in the state.

But, you know, Cameron's really trying to tie those two together and try to bring down Beshear's approval.

Meanwhile, she was trying to make some preemptive comments about this.

He started out in his opening statement making a bet about how many times Cameron would mention the president in in during the debate or during the discussion.

So he's trying to head this off the past.

But, you know, we'll see to what extent that works.

But I think if anything, it shows that, you know, Bishop is watching what's going on there.

There was there was kind of the longest discussion about education policy issues during that debate so far.

They discussed charter schools at length.

That's something that Daniel Cameron has not been willing to talk about so much.

Charter schools and so-called school choice policies.

That's something that a lot of Republicans, the legislature support and have been trying to pass or kind of make sure that that gets enacted in Kentucky.

But there has been a pretty bipartisan coalition of folks trying to keep that from happening in Kentucky.

And they've been stymied so far by lawsuits and other things along probably a lot of public safety discussion as well during that debate.

I thought it was actually pretty interesting.

One of the questions was about this sweeping public safety plan that came out of the legislature about a month ago.

Some Republicans have proposed, including an expansion of the death penalty to a few different crimes, including a carjacking that leads to a death of fentanyl, drug trafficking that leads to an over a deadly overdose.

And and Beshear said he would be in favor of expand, possibly expanding the death penalty to two new crimes, although he didn't say specifically for any of those ones proposed.

I just thought it was interesting.

You know, really went out of his way to say that.

Meanwhile, there's been kind of a bipartisan movement of legislators trying to outlaw the death penalty in more cases in Kentucky, although that certainly changes a lot.

So it was an interesting, interesting discussion of the pretty policy focus.

But there are a whole lot of debates that are that are going to be coming up in Kentucky over the next couple of weeks.

Well, and they did discuss the United Auto Workers strike.

Right.

And the Kentucky Ford plant in Louisville and Beshear.

Many say artfully handled that question about how do you balance the business interests with what workers want.

And I think both of those candidates seem to have some eloquent responses, whether or not they answered the question might be up for debate.

Yeah, they're really trying to have the best of both worlds.

They were showing support for the union strikers and in law who've recently taken up the strike, but also showing support for the broader automakers as well, who are a large employer in Kentucky.

So there's a delicate balance there.

And they're they're trying to, you know, show political support for both.

Meanwhile, when we look at the coffers of the candidates, Beshear keeps raking it in.

Right.

I mean, he reported in the last, what, month or so, a pretty good sizable amount and really outpacing his Republican challenger, Daniel Cameron.

Yeah.

And over the over the 30 days before this reporting period last week, Beshear had raised $1.5 million over that period.

And Cameron raised about a little over $500,000.

This reflects what's been going on pretty much throughout the campaign this year, really been outraising of Cameron.

This a lot of this has to do with being the incumbent governor.

The there's a lot of, you know, fundraising goes along with that and really being able to use the office not necessarily openly for campaign fundraising purposes, but certainly have a much higher, higher profile position when you're asking would be campaign donors.

I thought that one interesting thing about this is really how much more Cameron's PAC has become reliant on on PAC spending on outside groups supporting his campaign.

In this tail end of it.

Meanwhile, you know, they do have a kind of, you know, similar ish amounts of of cash on hand.

And and Republicans say that they they have enough money to to show support for Cameron from here out until the election.

But, yeah, there's a lot of money flowing through this.

This is definitely the most expensive race that's taken place in Kentucky history.

And certainly this year it's the most expensive race that's going on in the country right now.

Right.

And with Louisiana's outcome already determined, I mean, all eyes are really on Kentucky right now to see if Governor Beshear in a red Republican state can secure a second term and the path that he took to get there.

So a lot to talk about on the other side of November the seventh finally, and the minute we have remaining.

There's a lot happening in Washington right now or not happening, however you want to characterize it, as they try to get another speaker of the House.

And Jim Jordan of Ohio is really making a run for this.

And at the time we talked, didn't look good.

What are the Kentucky implications for this?

The thing that we've been watching is how the how the Kentucky representatives in Congress are voting and they've stayed in lockstep so far.

You know, they all voted in favor of keeping former Speaker McCarthy in place last week, and now they're all voting in favor of Jim Jordan.

Thomas Massie has been the most outspoken supporter of Jim Jordan in this in this round of the speakership election.

It doesn't look like things are heading in the right direction for for Jordan ultimately win that.

I think it's also pretty interesting just you know, what this means for a you know, a Republican Party that's trying to cast a bit of a big tent and in carrying, you know, a wide part of the wing of Republican Party, of Republicans.

You know, Jim Jordan's one of the central figures in the January six fiasco, the insurrection that took place.

He forwarded messages to then chief of staff, Mark Meadows, that were, you know, kind of had some some interesting legal arguments for how Vice President Pence could help change the outcome of the election.

Instead.

I just think it's pretty interesting for, you know, some moderate Republicans to be voting for for this figure.

Again, it doesn't look like this nomination is is heading in the right direction, though, for him to be successful.

Yeah.

Something to keep our eyes on, as is all of it, actually.

Good to see you, Rylan.

Thank you so very much, as always.

Thanks, Renee.