GEOFF BENNETT: Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear has become one of the most closely watched Democrats in the country.

A two-term governor in a deeply red state, Beshear has won statewide office twice, even as President Trump carried Kentucky by wide margins.

In recent years, he's navigated devastating tornadoes and floods, culture war battles over abortion and LGBTQ rights, and the economic pressures facing working families.

Now, as Democrats, search for a message that can resonate beyond blue states and with the 2028 conversation already simmering, Beshear's approach to faith, civility, and bipartisan governance is drawing national attention.

Governor Andy Beshear joins us now.

Welcome to the "News Hour."

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR (D-KY): Thanks for having me.

GEOFF BENNETT: So, as we said, you have won twice in a deeply red state.

What have you figured out that might be instructive for national Democrats?

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR: Well, for me, it's about starting with the realization that most people aren't as political as we think they are.

When they're getting up in the morning, they're not thinking about the next political race.

They're thinking about their job and whether they can support their family.

They're thinking about the roads and bridges they drive.

They're thinking about their next doctor's appointment for themselves, their parents, or their kids.

They're thinking about the school they dropped their kids off at and whether they feel safe in their community.

So what I do is, I spend 80 percent of my time focused on those court issues that impact all the people of Kentucky and of the United States of America.

I think a second thing that I try to do is talk like a normal human being.

And a lot of advocacy speak has crept into especially the language of the Democratic Party.

It makes it sound like we're talking at people, instead of to people, or sometimes like we're even talking down to them.

I will give you one painful example.

In Kentucky, we got hit by the opioid epidemic harder than just about anyone.

We have all lost people we love and care about, but I haven't lost a single person to substance use disorder.

I have lost them to addiction.

Now, addiction has meaning.

It's that killer that takes someone from you.

Or, when you're in recovery, you deserve the credit of going up against that really difficult opponent that the word addiction makes people feel.

But I think the last point is the most important.

I don't just talk about my what, because Democrats are very good on the policy.

We can tell you policy point two, subpoint three, bullet point four, I, I, I underneath.

But we rarely talk about why we believe what we believe.

For me, that's my faith.

It's that golden rule that says we love our neighbors, ourself and the parable of the good samaritan that says everyone is our neighbor.

And so when I talk about different decisions I have had to make, different vetoes I have had to make, I respect voters enough to not just tell them the what, but also the why.

GEOFF BENNETT: Let me ask you this, because there is plenty of data to show that key industries in your state, farming and manufacturing, have faced major headwinds as a result of President Trump's economic and trade policies.

And yet voters there are still supportive of him by and large.

What explains that disconnect?

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR: Well, they're waking up.

They're waking up because we are succeeding in spite of Donald Trump and not because of him.

Now, since I became governor, we have broken every record from private sector investment to new jobs.

Our average incentivized wage last year was $30 an hour.

We are actually making life better for our citizens, trying to expand health care, investing in those roads and bridges, and seeing public safety improve year after year.

But what Donald Trump has done hasn't made life easier.

It's made it harder.

His tariff policy has added $1,600 or $1,700 of cost to our families, who are already struggling with how costs nationally are rising.

His big ugly bill is going to devastate not just rural health care, but rural America.

It threatens to close 35 rural hospitals in my state.

So I think the American people are starting to see not just the fact that the Trump administration makes life harder, but that they go about their business with a level of cruelty that the American people just aren't going to accept.

GEOFF BENNETT: As we said, you are a two-term Democratic governor in a red state.

That alone puts you on the short list for 2028.

How seriously should we take this idea that you might run?

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR: Well, I have got a lot of work to do this year first.

I have got to keep Kentucky on our winning streak.

I'm also head of the Democratic Governors Association.

So, before I can look at a race in 28, I have 36 races in 2026.

And we are going to win in places that people aren't expecting.

It's important to do that, because, when Democratic governors win, we do what Republicans don't.

We govern well.

We make sure that we're focused on our people and their everyday lives.

And we improve the lives for the people in our state.

But if folks out there, especially on the Democratic side, want a map in 2028 that's not just five states with zero margin of error, yes, it helps to flip a House seat in Des Moines.

But flipping the governor's office in Iowa is how we change that map.

GEOFF BENNETT: Governor, as you well know, there's a real hunger right now in parts of your party for a fighter, someone who meets confrontation with confrontation.

You're often described as measured, even too nice.

How do you respond to the Democrats who worry that your approach might not be the right one for the moment?

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR: I wouldn't mistake kindness for weakness.

I have gone up against a Republican incumbent governor in Kentucky who was Donald Trump before Donald Trump.

And I'm the one still standing.

I went up against the rising star of the RNC that had the backing of Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell.

I just do it in a different way.

I was always taught that, if someone's yelling and you yell back at them, then no one can hear anything.

And I believe that, by 2028, Democrats, Republicans and independents are going to want anything but someone like Donald Trump.

And so a Democratic version of that, it doesn't heal the country.

It doesn't bring us back together.

I think people are going to want stability.

They're going to want their kids and I want my kids to have a United States that's stable, that we didn't have to worry about its future existence on a daily basis.

I think that's what all of our families crave and it's what they deserve.

GEOFF BENNETT: I want to come back to this issue of faith, because you announced a book coming out in the fall.

And it's described as "an insightful book that reclaims faith as a force for good in public life and rebukes those who use it to harm and discriminate."

That's what's on the publisher's Web site.

When so many white evangelicals have already fused their faith with a particular movement, the MAGA movement, Donald Trump, they backed Trump widely in the last three elections, is your book trying to persuade them or is it speaking to a different constituency altogether?

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR: Well, the book is speaking to anyone, whether you're a person of faith or not, regardless of what your faith is.

It's about the fact that faith calls us to help people and not harm people.

One of the inspirations for the book for me was, I remember being in church on Sunday and my pastor said, you know when your faith has been hijacked when suddenly your God hates all the same people that you do.

And so, in writing the book, "Go and Do Likewise," the title, those are the last words of the parable of the good samaritan.

It's not just a story.

It's an instruction that we're supposed to lift people up and not kick them while they're down.

And what you're going to see in the book is, I'm going to call out when we have leaders that are making decisions that harm people, especially when they are against the example set by Jesus.

I think about Donald Trump's cuts to SNAP.

About 100,000 people are going to lose their SNAP benefits in Kentucky, and the fact that he became the first president in history to not fund SNAP during a government shutdown.

Well, the miracle of the fishes and the loaves, which is all about people having enough to eat, is in the first four books of the Gospel, the first four.

That means it's pretty darn important if you call yourself a Christian.

GEOFF BENNETT: Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, thanks again for your time this evening.

We appreciate it.

GOV.

ANDY BESHEAR: Thank you.