Kentucky is getting a new governor in 2027, and competition for the office is already heating up. Two prominent Democrats are battling for their party’s nomination: Lt. Gov. Jacqueline Coleman and Rocky Adkins, former senior advisor to Gov. Beshear.
Coleman and Adkins are very different candidates on the face. Adkins is over 20 years older than Coleman (something she was happy to point out last week in her Fancy Farm speech) and arguably represents an older expression of the Democratic Party. Although Adkins was once among the more conservative Democrats in the Kentucky House—including even identifying with the pro-life caucus—his silence on many of today’s most contentious social issues has left some questioning whether his positions have evolved.
Unlike Adkins, Coleman has been much more outspoken on several of the Democratic Party’s increasingly progressive priorities. And for a campaign that she argues is “for the little guy,” these positions are quite alarming.
In 2014, Coleman led an unsuccessful bid for state representative in House District 55 against a Republican incumbent. During this bid, Coleman campaigned as a pro-life candidate—stating at a Mercer County candidate forum, “I am a pro-life, compassionate Democrat who believes in exceptions for the life of the mother, rape and incest.”
Coleman no longer identifies as legislatively pro-life. Instead, her rhetoric now emphasizes a woman’s “right to make her own reproductive and health care decisions”—decisions she previously believed resulted in the taking of a human life.
Another alarming progressive policy embraced by Coleman is her support for transgender procedures for minors. When the General Assembly passed Senate Bill 150 (SB 150) in 2023, Coleman had strong words against the legislature’s action. The bill banned so-called “gender-affirming care” for anyone under 18 years of age, including surgeries, puberty blockers, and cross-sex hormone treatments.
Coleman argued this measure marginalized “an already marginalized set of young people.” She went on to call it “egregious government overreach.” But is it really overreach for government to protect minors from making life-altering decisions that result in the mutilation of their bodies, the inability to have children, and ongoing mental health concerns? In fact, it is the very duty of government to protect children and to prevent these irreversible procedures from taking place.
According to a 2025 survey conducted by Ipsos and The New York Times, 71% of Americans oppose Coleman’s position on this issue, saying that no one under age 18 should have access to puberty-blocking drugs or hormone therapy.
It is also noteworthy that while Coleman considers legislation like SB 150 “egregious government overreach,” she was notably silent when the Beshear administration committed actual government overreach (according to the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky) by restricting interstate travel during COVID-19.
In fact, Coleman is not the only Democratic gubernatorial candidate who has been silent on many of Beshear’s more controversial policies. While Rocky Adkins is quick to highlight his previous role as senior advisor to the Governor, he has largely avoided publicly identifying with many of Beshear’s more progressive social positions.
This list includes Beshear’s embrace of transgender ideology, his controversial response to COVID-19, and his public identification with controversial anti-Christian groups like the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.
But many speculate whether the increasingly progressive and aggressive Democratic Party will lead to an evolution in Adkins’ views as he chases the party’s nomination.
There is already an indication that this evolution is occurring. In July, Adkins (who for years was a member of the pro-life caucus of the Kentucky House of Representatives) announced in an interview that he has “evolved on that issue” and now wants expanded abortion access in the Commonwealth as well as the reinstatement of the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision.
Time will tell whether Coleman and Adkins will continue to embrace the policy shifts of their increasingly radical national party. The candidates may want to label themselves moderates, but if they follow in the footsteps of the national party platform, they are likely to not fare well in a state that rejected Kamala Harris’s similar strategy in 2024 by a margin of nearly 2-to-1.
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