The wheels on Dr. Kandiss Taylor’s campaign bus are going round and round these days.
While incumbent Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and challenger David Perdue spar in headline-grabbing televised Debates, Taylor, a third Republican candidate, is crisscrossing the state, stumping in towns and cities and places in between.
She’s been to Richmond Hill twice and Pembroke once, and as the May 24 primaries draw near – early voting begins Monday, May 2 – supporters here say the South Georgia educator’s grassroots campaign and it’s “morality over money,” message has gotten them excited about politics again.
“Politicians use a lot of rhetoric,” Taylor said. “I don’t.
The political climate right now is charged with people who want real. They realize government is not working for them. They know government of and by and for the people has failed them.”
Dismissing polls that show her running a distant third, Taylor’s stance is that of an outsider, looking to unseat “establishment politicians who feel like they’re entitled to the governor’s seat, the secretary of state’s seat,” she said. “The founding fathers meant for us to serve and come home. We need to get away from that entitlement mentality of establishment politicians. It wasn’t meant to
be a career.” A wife, mother and school counselor with a doctorate who spent 18 years working for the Appling County School System, Taylor said a commencement speech by Dr. Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon who served as secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Donald Trump, inspired her to get involved – “to do something, not just complain about things,” she said.
Among the things Taylor said she will do if elected is cut the education budget and remove “a lot of frivolous spending on a lot of programs teachers don’t want shoved down their throat,” she said, adding that “teachers are having to teach to tests, and it’s killing teacher’s passion.” Programs Taylor said she wants to keep out of Georgia schools include critical race theory, social emotional learning and comprehensive sex education. She’s also unabashedly pro-life, and would also make it illegal to get an abortion “when there is any proof of pregnancy at all,” according to her website.
As for the economy, Taylor said she would focus on infrastructure and economic development while giving agriculture, one of the state’s largest industries, more support.
Georgia’s “No. 1 for business,” claims are true, Taylor said, and have been for years before Kemp, “because Georgia is a great place to be.”
Yet she cited threats from big corporations and Hollywood to boycott the state over conservative measures passed in recent years, including election and abortion laws, as proof the state is letting others dictate its values.
“We’re in the Bible Belt,” she said. “We’re going to put morality over money.”
After an unsuccessful run at her party’s nomination for the U.S. Senate race in 2020, Taylor said she thought she might use that name recognition in a bid for a seat in the General Assembly. But that changed as claims by President Donald Trump that the 2020 presidential election count in Georgia was fraudulent took root and spread, despite three recounts.
Like a number of Republicans, Taylor blames Kemp and Republican Secretary of State David Raffensperger, who refused to overturn the results of the election in which Trump lost by less than 12,000 votes.
“I know half the people in Georgia think the election was fair and half think there was fraud. But if half the people in Georgia feel like there was fraud, you have to do a forensic election audit,” Taylor said.
What’s more, she said if elected she’ll work to remove Dominion voting machines and drop boxes and require paper ballots. Taylor also said she wants to provide more support for the state’s 700,000 veterans through appointing a liaison between the governor’s office and the VA. She listed prison reform, mental health reform and addressing the opioid/fentanyl epidemic as priorities.
In addition to Trump, Taylor’s political idols include a pair of former presidents: Harry Truman and John F.
Kennedy. “Today (Kennedy) would be a Republican, not a Democrat,” Taylor said. She’s a fan of Georgia Congresswoman Rep. Marjorie Taylor Green, whom Taylor called “a true patriot, 100 percent conservative,” and “very down to earth. She loves America, she loves Georgia.” Taylor said.
Taylor has gotten national attention for her “Jesus, guns, and babies,” campaign slogan, which was initially credited to Greene and which sums up “the three most important things in the conservative movement,” Taylor said. “The First Amendment is about the right to worship freely,” she said. “The Second Amendment gives us the right to bear arms and to protect ourselves.”
As for her reference to babies, it reflects her belief abortion is wrong, she said. “Babies are a gift from God.” On unpaid leave as she stumps for votes and appeals directly to voters, Taylor said to her the election is about “truth versus deception, and the establishment versus the rest of us.”
You can read more about Taylor on her website, https://kandisstaylor.com.