midterm election, new ads and new twists in the sixth district race.

Also, Barr and Booker continue their fight in Kentucky's open U.S.

Senate race.

Democratic candidate for Governor Rocky Adkins claims a fundraising record before the year.

The elections to be held.

More cameras about to go up along interstates to catch speeders bracing for some tropical weather here in Kentucky comment Good evening.

I'm Bill Bryant, and we welcome you to comment on Kentucky.

A look back at and some analysis of the week's news in the Commonwealth and the guests on our panel of working Kentucky journalists tonight are.

Mason Brighton, political reporter for Spectrum News one.

Also tonight, Sylvia Goodman, Capitol reporter for Kentucky Public Radio, and John Cheeves, reporter Lexington Herald-Leader.

We'll get straight to politics tonight.

Justover three weeks to go until the November 3rd election.

And thena hard fought race for Congress in Central Kentucky.

Voters are being hit with texts and direct mail and ads all over TV and social media, and Governor Beshear is now appeared in an ad for Zach Dembo.

>> I approve this message because Kentucky.

[MUSIC] Ralph Alvarado would be even worse.

I thought we got rid of this guy.

>> Yeah, tell me about it.

>> He'll fight to lower taxes and protect Social Security.

Ralph Alvarado independent leadership.

[MUSIC] I'mDoctor Ralph Alvarado, and I approve this message.

>> All right.

Clearly two different approaches.

Zach Dembo going all in trying to connect.

Ralph Alvarado to former his policies.

And then you have Governor Beshear appearing in an ad for Dembo.There.

>> Yeah.

As we were discussing earlier, I mean, Matt Bevin was an unpopular one term governor.

He got voted out.

He had a sharp tongue on him.

He offended a lot of people on his way out the door.

He issued some very controversial pardons of some pretty awful people.

And more recently, he went to jail in a in Louisville and made some pretty bad headlines there.

He's not the kind of person you want to be associated with.

Unfortunatelyfor Ralph Alvarado, he ran back in 2019 for lieutenant governor when Bevin ran for governor for reelection, they ran on a ticket together, bumper stickers, pictures, handshakes all of them are still out there.

So one of Zach Dembo strategies is to tie them together to when you think about Ralph Alvarado,think about Matt Bevin.

>> All right.

But you have Alvarado's campaign saying he opposed what he called Matt Bevin's grotesque pardons.

>> Well, I don't knowthat Senator Alvarado.

He was in the stateSenate at the time.

Really opposed them, per se.

The Republican Senate caucus did condemn them as a group, and Alvarado was in the caucus, to be fair.

And they did vote for a proposed constitutional amendment to restrict the governor's pardoning power, which all these years later, is finally on the ballot this fall.

In just a few weeks.

And Alvarado voted for that.

And thatcould be seen as a rebuke.

But in terms of standing up on the Senate or the House floor, like many of his Republican and Democratic colleagues did, and callingout Matt Bevin, I don't remember that.

He sort of fell silentat the time.

Maybe he whispered it into the broom closet or something.

>> You know, there's something interestingabout this because we were just, I think many of us on this panel will probably reading Governor Beshear's book that he came out with.

He's back from his booktour on that now.

But in that book, he compared Bevin to Trump a lot.

He called him Trump lite.

A lot of the times it was a pretty large about Bevin and tying him to Trump.

This is kind of the flip side of that, where Dembo is tying his opponent to Bevin and also tying himself to Beshear, who is a relatively popular governor, a pretty popular governor still in Kentucky.

And, you know, he's making thiskind of same plea.

And then we also saw Beshear show up in that ad.

And I don't know that I've seen Beshear show up in an ad for other state candidates.

Certainly notthis election cycle.

interesting move.

And we'll see how effective it is.

But it's Alvarado has pushed back against it quite fiercely.

>> I don't think the Dembo campaign necessarily went into all ofthis, you know, looking to make as many comparisons.

And, you know, relations.

Back to Bevin, except for the fact that we didhave the arrest And he spent roughly two weeks in a jail in Louisville.

And I think that of attention.

And it got people thinking, well, who's this Matt Bevincharacter?

Maybe.

I don't remember him.

And they see that connection.

And that's something Dembos campaign has has really capitalized on.

>> House speaker Mike Johnson apparently attended a fundraiser for Alvarado in Lexington.

That was earlier today.

John, a high dollar event, obviously an opportunity to raise money for Alvarado.

>> It wasit was veryhush hush.

The invitations leaked out.

The address in Lexington was a secret.

You had to RSVP to find out where it was.

It was $3,500 a person, $5,000 to get a photo, presumably of the speaker.

And it was just to raise money.

This was not something they wanted.

The press at or the general public at.

I guess, Speaker Johnson flew in and flew out.

Apparently, who knows?

Alvarado's talk tous about it.

It was a sort of thing you do when you're really looking for a little shotin the arm financially.

>> It's different because when Congressman Barr had the previous speaker in the district, he went around with him.

Theydid.

>> That's what youordinarily do is if you have a VIP coming to visit you to show how important they think you are, you want to you want to show them off to the press, to local people.I don't think Congress is very popular right now.

I don't think any person running for office wants tosay, hey, look, I hang outwith the head of the House of Representatives.

You just do that for the donors.

>> I also noticed in late September, I saw a flier also kind of leaked out.

It was not meant for me to see.

I don't think, where Majority Leader SteveScalise also was in town.

He was held a fundraiser for Ralph Alvarado.

I asked about that event was very quickly shut down.

No press allowed, not for the public.

So just another example is a littlebit less of a pricey event than this most recent one, but it clearly they'rebringing a lot of VIPs, but not rolling them out for the press.

>> Mason the Dembo camp has been circulating some internal polls done by Democratic linked organizations.

We always give the caveats with the internal polls that they are, you know, only releasing what they want us to see.

We keep that in mind.

But what motivates a campaign to release those numbers at all?

>> I think you see those released when it makes the candidate look good.

It's something that they produce themselves.

They have the questions and theymade the phone calls ortexts or emails, what have you.

And it's, I think, a good win, especially late in the race.

But, you know, while it may lookgood for Dembo in this poll that was conducted, I think it is something that we need to always remind people about.

Is that asterisk and explain that this may not be a true, you know, you know, full look at what the race is looking like at this exact >> Let's talkmessaging just for a minute.

Alvarado, obviously appealingto the district's GOP lean but has shifted to affordability and to promises to improve health care and called himself or that that ad characterized him as independent.

An interesting choice of words, right?

>> I mean, this is a district that has a pretty large chunk of independent voters that they now have to appeal to.

And I think many of us have also seen this NBC article that came out that pointed to the very shifts inAlvarado's messaging, particularly on his website, from whenhe won the primary until present.

I mean, it was a website that really championed his endorsement from President Trump, you know, called him triple endorsed all these things, said that he would fight the the woke mob said that he would support President Trump's agenda to.

Now we have pictures of Alvarado with his family, maybe some solo pics as he's talks about health care, talks about affordability,talks about Kentucky jobs.

It's.

It's aclear shift in messaging here.

And I think it's to appeal to that independent voter base that's really key to winning this election.

>> Meanwhile, John Alvarado has criticized his work as a federal prosecutor, in which case he prosecuted some members of law enforcement.

>> Hedid.

There was anevent in Frankfort where the FraternalOrder of Police endorsed Ralph and the criticism at the event was that Zach Dembo has prosecuted cops, and Alvarado said, you know, he abused his authority.

He abused the awesome power of the federal government to unfairly target police officers.

And that's why some police just they don't know about Zach Dembo.

And I was curious.

I pulled Zach Dembo record going back ten Court, first with the Department of Justice and then with the U.S.

Attorney'sOffice in Lexington.

And I found a 38 cases where he prosecuted police officers and jail and prison guards, mostly in Kentucky, but in other states, too.

And he mostly won convictions, mostly got people to plead guilty, got him convicted, sometimes it was just terrible crimes, violations of people's civil rights, windows, out of their cars, beat people when they were handcuffed and shackled.

Prison guards that beat up inmates in the showers when theywere handcuffed lied about it on the forms to cover it up.

And so I askedthe Alvarado campaign which of these criminal violations of people's civil rights did you think were illegitimate,shouldnot have been prosecuted, and they didn't have any comment?

I would hope thatthat sort of thing is not seen as anti-police.

I would hope it's seen as pro civil rights for everyone.

>> Well, it's going to be interesting.

That it appears to be the campaign to watch in Kentucky this year.

And of course many of the predictive maps painted lightly Reed still.

And we'll see.

Right.

I mean.

>> Mostpoll, most of the election handicappers that I've seen at this rate, I think three this as a lean Republican district.

I think the latest I saw was theCook Political Report.

Hadhad rated it lean Republican.

They were one of the the holdouts.

I mean, at first it was safe Republican.

It was in the staunchly red.

And they've slowly shifted it towards this.

>> So.

Well, the sixth district House race is wide open because Andy Barr chose to run for the U.S.

Senate, and Republican nominee facing Democrat Charles Booker this week, only Booker appeared for an interview at KET.

Despite both candidates being invited.

>> Andy Barr has supported data centers because they're paying him.

These telecom groups are paying him.

AT&T, Comcast, Microsoft, they're paying him and he's turning his back on us.

Now here in Lexington, we're in Andy district, so he should be here.He does excuse.We came to his home hometown Lexington, voted for a moratorium ondata centers.

And I support the people who are speaking up and speaking out.

That's part of my Kentucky first agenda.

And that's why the people of Kentucky are standing with me.

And we're in a real position to win this.

>> So, Mason you hear there, Booker obviously throwing data centers in every shot he got.

But seeing the advantage that some Democrats have in polling around the country, Booker keeps trying to lay out a path to victory, as you heard him do.

There.

But doesn't Barr just have a lot ofbuilt in advantages, including money and party registration?

I mean, they're Republicans outnumber Democrats in registration now by more than 250,000 in Kentucky.

>> I mean, the scales tip towards Barr favor Barrs favor.

In this chance.

It is anuphill battle for Booker.

I can tell you on the drive in from Louisvillethis evening, I saw a lot of bar signs, a lot of demo signs, andAlvarado ones.

Not seeing a lot of Charles Booker signs from here to there.

We did.

Spectrum spoke with Booker this week.

He tells us he's been to every county in thestate.

He's knocking on doors.

But if we'll have to wait and see if translates in enough votes to overcome a lot of advantages that Barr currently has.

>> One of the big things that we're hearing is that there is a an enthusiasm gap for a lot of Republicans.

But even with that, I mean, the numbers that you citedare a huge uphill battle.

Are people willing to vote for a Democrat or Republicans in the state willing to vote for a Democratic senator?

They haven't for a long it's interesting to watch.

>> Ken Booker get enough attention to have a good.

>> Show going to be tough.

I mean, as Mason said, this is a conservative Republicanstate.

It's considered almost miraculous when a Democrat breaks through.

That's why Andy Beshear gets somuch attention, becausehe did it twice.

And it's why demo is getting attentionnow, because evenin the Central Kentucky sixth district, which is more Democratic than the statewide total, he's looking pretty strong.

But otherwise it's just it's such an uphill climb.

And Booker's got the wind in his face, not at his back.

>> Sylvia Joe Sonka, reporter for Kentucky Public Radio.

There was a rare Monthly registration blip in which the Democrats did not register Republicans.

In September.

>> Right when Joe and I got the Monthly email from the Secretary used to seeing Democrats either, you know,getting much fewer registrants than Republicans or even losing, you know, more often than not, I think they've lost registrants over the last decade or so, and they've really lost so muchground.

I mean, when you look at the graphs, it's really just heading in opposite directions for so long now.

But for the first time, and I think Joe reported was eight years, Democratic registrants outpaced Republican.

Now, does that mean that number of registrants?

No.

Republicans still have a huge advantage in this state, but it might showjust some shifting in in the political winds come November.

Imean, we're already seeing again, like I mentioned, this enthusiasm gap, this frustration with the Trump administration might play out even in local races.

>> And the independents tend to be out registering both parties.

>> In September.

They outpaced both of them.

It continues to climb.

It's 11%, as counted as other not Democrat, not Republican.

>> And by the way,Booker and Barr are set todebate Monday night, October 19th.

Itwill be at KY t in Lexington and broadcast statewide on gray media stations.

Now there was a debate this week in the Lexington mayor's race.

Incumbent Linda Gorton is seeking a third term in She's being challenged by businesswoman Raquel Carter.

I had a good seat for that.

Asa moderator.

The two clashed over snow removal flock cameras and data centers.

It also got heated when Carter pushed back against Gorton, repeatedly questioning her opponent's relevant experience.

>> It's not unusual as a woman and as a black woman and as a professional business person.

It is not unusual To question your experience, but I am surprised to have that be done to me by awoman.

>> I oversee an almost $900 million total budget.

This is not little peanuts.

This is big work.

And to have the experience, to understand how to manage this kind of an organization isnot something you can just pick up and do.

>> So John some tension there over >> Yeah.

Miss Carter seems to sensea few areas where Mayor Gorton is vulnerable, where the public is unhappy on flock cameras that the police use.

The city is going to have a study.

Mayor Gorton says we're going to see what we need to do with these.

If we need to keep them on the streets, on data centers, which the public has turned against the city of Lexington has imposed a one year moratorium on the construction of the Lexington, an city of Lexington has bungled for the last two years.

Keeping our schools closed.

Mayor Gorton says she has a plan.

She's going tofigure out a way to deal with this.

This is her greatest vulnerability.

I think it's the one that puts her job as mayor most at risk.

And Miss Carter has really been pressing her on that.

>> And again, she really the Gorton administration is to release aplan next week.

Right.

>> That's that's what we're told.

>> All right.

Now.

So those local across the state and they get maybe a little lost in the shuffleof all the noise.

>> Right,right.

I mean, everyone reports on the federal races.

We get national reporters coming in to report on federal races too.

But these local races are so important in Louisville.Obviously, it's the firsttime we've had a nonpartisan mayoral race.

And so that's coming up.

Louisville Public Media joined the Louisville on that as well.

So, I mean, but these races are so important and it's much harder to find informationon them, which.

So tune into your local, your local media stations.

We've got the information you need.

But I mean, judges, state legislators, mayors, districts, all of these thingsare so important.

And probably could get even more attention, should get more attention.

>> And legislative well.

And Kentucky Republicans, of course, confident in holding their supermajorities in both chambers of the legislature.

But this week, Tom Loftus reported for Kentucky Lantern that Republican groups have spent more than $620,000 Mason to reelect Senator Julie Raque Adams.

She faces Democrat Sarah Cole McIntosh.

Is that seen as a close race?

>> I. This is a race thathas got a lot of money put much more than many of the other racesat the state level.

I think Democrats think they have a chance here.

Looking nationally, the president's popularity issues like inflation and gas and conflict in the MiddleEast, they believe that perhaps that's going to givethem a chance to capitalize in this seat.

This is one that Adams has held for several terms.

Now, this is far eastern Jefferson is fairly predominantly red, kind of like the Bookerrace.

This is going to be another uphill battle for them to win a seat.

But in the long term, supermajority still stays Republican regardless.

>> Drive through voting is going to be tried in Louisville, right?

>> This is going to be a first of its kind, is what the county clerk there tells us details of exactly how it's going to work is still yet to We do know that it has to be inside, so the cars will have to drive into one of the buildings to do the voting.

It can't be in the parking lot.

We're going to see how that plays out on Election Day.

>> All right, that'll be interesting.

So we have all these races coming up in just a few weeks.

And then next year's race for governor keeps popping into view.

And this week, Democratic candidate Rocky Adkins announced he has set a record for money raised right out of the gate.

Adkins campaign says he raised than $1.75 million in the first quarter after he got in.

>> When I look at the donations, it's coming from across party aisles and that's really encouraging.

Whenyou see that most people are telling me, they're saying,Rocky, look, you're qualified for this job.

You have the experience to do this job, and you have a vision of how tolead us forward.

>> So Adkins are claiming some momentum, start, at least in fundraising.

He says more than 1500 people contributed to his campaign.

>> I can't believe we're already on the governor's race, but we are.

We have been for it feels like money isflowing.

The money isclearly flowing.

And, you know, Adkins, the Kentucky Lantern did a great analysis looking into some of his donors.

He's got a lot of these big institutional donors already giving him money Coleman is clearly lagging quite a bit infundraising.

Despite startingher campaign significantly before him, several months before him, I should say, you know, obviously we don't have a I don't think we've had a major Republican enter the race yet, but all of us are expecting James Comer to enter that race.

Congressman comer but, you know, it's clearly already becoming such a major issue.

And we already tell it's going to be a very competitive race, competitive primary.

But just competitive general election because Beshear did it.

I think Democrats arehopeful they can do itagain.

And so there's going to be a lot of money in picking which Democratic contender we end up going with.

>> And Lieutenant Governor Coleman reported late this afternoon fundraising.

>> She did just over a half million, right.

Just over $500,000 for about a third of what Rocky got.

>> And that was that's total raised since she got in in April.

I think, at that point.

All right.

So we continue towatch that.

Well, data center discussions are ongoing in the state.

A crowd packed Lexington City Hall a couple of times thisweek before the council extended a moratorium.

>> I am 100% in favor of data centers.

I use them, I know what theycan do, but they have to be controlled.

>> Ifyou are serious about representing our community, it's clear what you need to do.

Start by extending the moratorium by at least two years.

And then during the moratorium, pass laws that will effectively ban all AI data center construction and expansion in Lexington.

>> Well, no matter where the state data centers are talked about or across the state.

John the crowd show up, and they certainly have in Lexington.

>> It's amazing howmuch this has deteriorated for the backers of data centers.

It was just two years ago that the legislature created a huge tax break, a 50 year sales tax break to attract data centers to Kentucky.

And then last year, it expanded it.

The Kentucky Center for Economic Policy warns this could be a $1 billion tax giveaway to the data center.

People.

Now you hear the beep, beep beep politicians backing up to curb that tax break because nobody wants to be seen as being in favor of data centers anymore.

The public has turned on them and the politicians are belatedly rushing to get ahead of the crowd so they can be leaders again.

>> It is the surprising issue of the year.

>> It really is.

It's exploded.

Imean, I hearing communities all across Kentucky that are really showing meetings, they'relearning a lot more about their local governments than maybe they did before I was, you know, I've spent a lot of time in Carroll County where they have two giant data centers hoping to locate.

Andit's really galvanized people, I should say.

While we have a lot of local politicians taking a step back, calling for moratoriums still on the federal level, President Trump has not backed down from his support ofdata centers and AI in you know,he's running for Senate like we've just been discussing.He still says that he doesn't want to see he wants to leave this up to local communities and really emphasizes the national security concerns of not having enough data centers and data processing capabilities and keeping ahead of China and the AI race.

So it's not a complete wash yet, but it certainly seemstobe shifting a things on the local level.

I think a lot of local races are really dependent on data centers.

Right now.

We're hearing a lot of competition on that front.

>> And it's worth noting that, you know, this year, state lawmakers tried to tackle this issue, put some sort of limits or caps or what have you on who's going to payfor the utilitiesand infrastructure fordata centers that never made it across the finish line?

We assume, and believe that this issue apriority next year.

But with the legislature not acting this year, we saw all of this reaction and momentum in many communities across Kentucky like Mercer, Carroll County, several places.

>> The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet says more cameras will be going up along interstates.

We've talked a lot about flock cameras, but these watch for speeders, especially in construction zones, at least seven more cameras will be going up.

Tickets are not issued directly, but an officer nearby can see those.

There seems to be more support for that thanthan for the flock cameras.

>> Yeah, these are called I want toget this right automated flagger assistance devices or a FADS.

I've seen these on the interstates around Kentucky.I didn't know what they were.

You're right.

The cameras around highway zones to keep the workers safe and to keep ussafe.

They detect speeders.

They notify law enforcement in the area, who then if they cancatch up with you, come and give you a ticket.

And there's there were 50 of them deployed by the transportation cabinet this summer.

Seven more.

Now, as you say.

>> The Soar summit was held in Corbin thisweek, bringing leaders together from across Appalachia totalk challenges and the future.

>> Well, the Source Summit is an opportunity tobring people together in Eastern Kentucky to try to help stimulate our economy, bring economic development and growth to our area.

>> Organizersobviously try to celebrate success and come up with strategies for the future for Kentucky, as part of Appalachia,right.

>> And at this summit, I believe that Governor Beshear joined.

Rogers to announce more funding to Eastern Kentucky.

We don't often see those two share a stagetogether, but they both said that, you know, we need more money in this region to supporteconomic development, to support infrastructure and things like that.

So, yeah, there was a lot of energy at that summit.

The Kentucky Lanternreported a little bit more on that, but definitely some energy we're seeing there.

>> No czar.

Van Ingram will retire at theend of the year.

Ingram is a former policechief, and he's been with the Office of Drug Control Policy for 22 years, surviving through administrationsfrom both parties.

Ingram is leaving Kentucky as overdose deaths are leaving his position in the state as Kentucky's deaths are trending down.

And so Governor Beshear also announced that he will appoint Tara Mosely Hyde to that of encouraging numbers for Ingram.

>> Four years of decreasing overdose, still more than a thousand Kentuckians a year dying, though, which is 1000 too many.

>> All right.

Former state Auditor Mike Harmon announced he is running for secretary of state next year.

He will join other candidates.

[MUSIC] Brad Holsclaw and Jack Whitfield.

So far in that Republican primary Monday night, 8 p.m.

eastern, seven Central.

Laura Rogers leads a candidate conversation in the U.S.

sixth district House race.

She'll be talking with Democratic nominee Zach Dembo.