After widespread speculation that Kentucky’s Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear was on the list of potential running mates for Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the Democratic National Convention, a new poll found Beshear is the most popular Democratic governor in the country.
The Morning Consult poll shows Beshear has a 67% approval rating, with 28% disapproving, placing him at second place among all governors. He falls behind Vermont Republican Gov. Phil Scott who has an astounding 81% approval rating.
The poll, which was conducted from April to June this year, also showed that Beshear had the highest approval rating among both Republican and Democratic voters of any Democratic governor. He came second place in popularity with independents compared to other Democratic governors, too.
According to the poll, Beshear was more popular in his home state than other contenders for the Democratic vice presidential nomination appeared in theirs. For example, approval ratings for Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper were more than 10 percentage points lower than Beshear’s.
Beshear is also the second most popular Democratic governor with young voters, ages 18 to 34. Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland beat him with 66% popularity. Moore was just behind Beshear as one of the most popular governors in the country.
Beshear has previously shown up as a governor with a high approval rating in Morning Consult surveys, which has a 1.3 out of three stars pollster rating according to political analytics site FiveThirtyEight.
Morning Consult surveys people within each state to gauge approval ratings for each governor, so it is unclear if Beshear’s approval rating would translate nationally.
Since 2020, Morning Consult shows Beshear’s approval rating has remained consistently above 50% and has trended upwards since a drop in 2021.
In stark contrast, Kentucky is also home to America’s least popular senator, according to another Morning Consult poll out Wednesday. Sen. Mitch McConnell found himself at the bottom of their rankings for the 14th consecutive quarter.
According to Morning Consult, 63% of Kentucky respondents disapproved of McConnell’s job performance — a higher percentage than those who disapproved of New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez, who has since said he will resign his Senate seat over a federal bribery conviction.
