When Stacey Abrams first ran for governor of Georgia in 2018, one of the biggest strikes she had against her was her financial status. Her critics wondered if she was able to handle her mounting debts.
Losing that election must have been the best thing that could happen to her, because four years later, as she begins her second shot at ruining the state she claims to love, she’s now worth $3.17 million, according to the financial disclosure forms she filed with the state in March.
Whereas in the last election, the specter of $54,000 in IRS debt hung over her head, Abrams now faces the opposite problem of getting rich off her political activism.
Naturally, the GOP is lapping up the news of Abrams’ financial gains to paint her as “an elitist out of touch with average Georgians,” reports WSB Radio. “Garrison Douglas, a spokesperson for the national Republican Party, accused Abrams of using her campaign ‘as a platform for her own financial gain.'”
Abrams’ opponents aren’t doing so badly themselves. Greg Bluestein of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution pointed out that Gov. Brian Kemp has reported a net worth of $8.2 million from his business ventures and increases in the value of his real estate holdings, while David Perdue, Kemp’s main challenger in the primaries, is worth $50 million. The former senator and retired CEO lives on an exclusive, gated island community on the Georgia coast.
It’s equally unsurprising that Abrams is protesting that Republicans are calling her out for her success.
“It is remarkable to me that success is now being demonized by the Republicans,” she told an interviewer. “I believe in success. I believe that every person should have the opportunity to thrive. And because I had three years where I was in the private sector, I leveraged all three years, and in that time, I’ve done my best to not only be successful personally, but to do what I can to help Georgians.”
No, Stacey, the problem isn’t that you’ve become successful. In fact, I’d argue that most Republicans would celebrate your success. The issue is how you earned those stacks of cash.
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Abrams has turned her 2018 loss into a full-fledged grievance industry. She started a “voting rights” PAC called Fair Fight Action which has done work nationwide, milking liberal fears of Democrats’ losing their ability to cheat in elections.
She didn’t claim any income from Fair Fight Action — which has $19.5 million in the bank — but her disclosures reveal just how big a moneymaker Abrams’ personal grievance has become. Here’s what the AJC reports:
In her most recent financial disclosure, Abrams reported roughly $320,000 in cash on hand and $1.8 million worth of real estate holdings, most of it a home she bought days before the general election in 2020 that’s valued at $1.2 million. A second home she bought, in Stone Mountain, is for her parents, Abrams’ campaign said.
She reported earning more than $1.5 million over the past three years from the Harry Walker Agency, an elite booking firm. And the Loewenthal Co. — a full-service literary agency — has paid more than $3.5 million since 2019 for books she wrote or is set to release.
She also listed receiving about $700,000 from the Roosevelt Institute, a liberal New York think tank, between 2019 and 2021. She disclosed that she served as executive director of the Southern Economic Advancement Project — which she founded — for the organization.
Abrams’ financial success from political grievances stands in contrast to Kemp, who earned his money through hard work in building a successful small business and real estate portfolio, and Perdue, who worked his way up to CEO of companies like Reebok and Dollar General (even though, under Perdue’s leadership, those corporations outsourced thousands of jobs to China).
On the surface, Stacey Abrams’ rise looks like an all-American success story that’s worth celebrating. But when you realize that she has become the darling of the left, including the media, based on the lie that she lost in 2018 because of voter fraud and cheating at the hands of the GOP, it’s yet another reason to want her to lose again this November.
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