Stacey Abrams facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Stacey Abrams
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Abrams in 2021
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| Minority Leader of the Georgia House of Representatives | |
| In office January 10, 2011 – July 1, 2017 |
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| Preceded by | DuBose Porter |
| Succeeded by | Bob Trammell |
| Member of the Georgia House of Representatives | |
| In office January 8, 2007 – August 25, 2017 |
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| Preceded by | JoAnn McClinton |
| Succeeded by | Bee Nguyen |
| Constituency | 84th district (2007–2013) 89th district (2013–2017) |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Stacey Yvonne Abrams
December 9, 1973 Madison, Wisconsin, U.S. |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Relatives | Leslie Abrams Gardner (sister) |
| Residences | Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. |
| Education |
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Stacey Yvonne Abrams (born December 9, 1973) is an American politician, lawyer, and author. She is also a strong supporter of voting rights. Abrams served in the Georgia House of Representatives from 2007 to 2017. During part of that time, from 2011 to 2017, she was the minority leader, meaning she led the main opposition party in the House.
Abrams is a member of the Democratic Party. In 2018, she started Fair Fight Action, an organization that works to stop voter suppression. Many people believe her efforts helped more people vote in Georgia. This included the 2020 presidential election, when Joe Biden won the state. Her work also helped Democrats gain control of the Senate in Georgia's 2020–21 U.S. Senate elections.
Abrams was the Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia in 2018. She was the first African-American woman from a major party to run for governor in the United States. She lost to Republican candidate Brian Kemp by a small number of votes. In 2019, Abrams was the first African-American woman to give the official response to the State of the Union address. She ran for governor again in 2022 but lost to Kemp once more.
Besides her political work, Abrams writes both fiction and nonfiction books. Her nonfiction books, Our Time Is Now and Lead from the Outside, became best sellers on New York Times list. Before 2021, Abrams wrote eight fiction books using the pen name Selena Montgomery. Her book While Justice Sleeps was released in 2021 under her real name. She also wrote a children's book called Stacey's Extraordinary Words, which came out in 2021.
Contents
Early Life and Education
Stacey Abrams was born in Madison, Wisconsin. She is the second of six children. Her parents, Robert and Carolyn Abrams, raised her in Gulfport, Mississippi. In 1989, her family moved to Atlanta, Georgia. Her parents studied to become Methodist ministers at Emory University.
Abrams went to Avondale High School and graduated as the top student in 1991. When she was 17 and still in high school, she worked for a political campaign. She started as a typist and then became a speechwriter because she improved a campaign speech.
College and Law School
In 1995, Abrams graduated with honors from Spelman College. She studied political science, economics, and sociology. While in college, she worked for Atlanta mayor Maynard Jackson. She also interned at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. In 1992, as a college freshman, Abrams protested at the Georgia Capitol. She joined others in burning the Georgia state flag because it included the Confederate battle flag. This flag design was added in 1956 to oppose the civil rights movement.
Abrams then studied public policy at the University of Texas at Austin's LBJ School of Public Affairs. She earned a Master of Public Affairs degree in 1998. In 1999, she earned a law degree from Yale Law School.
Legal and Business Work
After law school, Abrams worked as a tax lawyer in Atlanta. She focused on groups that don't pay taxes, healthcare, and public money. In 2010, while she was a member of the Georgia General Assembly, Abrams helped start NOW Corp. This company helps small businesses with their finances.
Abrams is also the CEO of Sage Works, a company that gives legal advice.
Nourish and Now Companies
Abrams co-founded Nourish, Inc. in 2010. It first aimed to make drinks for babies and toddlers. Later, it changed its name to Now and started helping small businesses with invoicing. In 2021, Now raised $9.5 million to grow its business.
Rewiring America
In 2023, Abrams joined Rewiring America as a senior counsel. This group works to help communities use more electricity, especially clean energy.
Political Career
In 2002, when she was 29, Abrams became a deputy city attorney for the City of Atlanta.
Serving in the Georgia General Assembly
In 2006, Abrams ran for the 84th District in the Georgia House of Representatives. She won the Democratic Party primary election with 51% of the votes.
Abrams served as a representative for District 84 starting in 2007. After some changes in district lines, she represented District 89 starting in 2013. Both districts included parts of Atlanta and DeKalb County. She worked on important committees like Appropriations and Rules.
In 2010, other Democratic lawmakers chose Abrams to be their minority leader. Her first big action was to work with Republican governor Nathan Deal to improve the HOPE Scholarship program. She helped create a law in 2011 that saved the HOPE program by lowering scholarship amounts and offering low-interest loans to students.
Time magazine said Abrams "single-handedly stopped the largest tax increase in Georgia history." In 2011, she showed that a Republican plan to cut income taxes but raise a tax on cable would actually make most Georgians pay more. She shared her findings with every lawmaker, and the bill failed.
Abrams also worked with Governor Deal on changes to the criminal justice system. These changes lowered prison costs without increasing crime. She also worked with Republicans on a large plan to fund public transportation.
On August 25, 2017, Abrams left the General Assembly to focus on her campaign for governor.
Running for Governor in 2018
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Abrams ran for governor of Georgia in 2018. She won the Democratic nomination on May 22, becoming the first Black woman from a major party to be nominated for governor in the U.S. After winning, she received support from important people, including former president Barack Obama.
The Republican candidate, Georgia's secretary of state Brian Kemp, was in charge of elections during this time. Kemp was accused of making it harder for some people to vote. For example, his office canceled over 1.4 million voter registrations between 2012 and 2018. Many of these cancellations happened in 2017, after Kemp announced he was running for governor.
By October 2018, Kemp's office had put over 53,000 voter registration applications on hold. More than 75% of these belonged to minority voters. A judge later found that Kemp's office had broken some election laws.
On November 6, 2018, Abrams lost the election by about 54,000 votes. On November 16, she announced she was ending her campaign. She said she could not close the gap with Kemp to force a second election. Abrams also announced the creation of Fair Fight Action, a group that works to protect voting rights.
Fair Fight Action filed a lawsuit in December 2018. The lawsuit claimed there were problems like long lines at polling places and issues with voter registration. Some of these issues were later addressed by new laws in Georgia. In October 2022, a judge ruled against Fair Fight on most of its remaining claims. The judge found that Georgia's voting rules did not break the Constitution or the Voting Rights Act.
Since the election, Abrams has said that the election was not fair. She believes that Kemp, who oversaw the election while running in it, had a conflict of interest. She also pointed to the large number of voter registrations that were removed. She has stated that she has "legally sufficient doubt about the process to say that it was not a fair election."
Role in National Politics
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In January 2019, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer announced that Abrams would give the official response to the State of the Union address. She was the first African-American woman to do this. She was also the first person who did not hold a public office to give the response since 1966.
Abrams decided not to run for the U.S. Senate in 2020. She said she needed to focus on stopping voter suppression. In August 2019, Abrams announced Fair Fight 2020. This group helps Democrats in 20 states build teams to protect voting rights.
During the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries, Abrams openly said she wanted to be former vice president Joe Biden's running mate. Kamala Harris was chosen instead. Abrams was one of 17 speakers who gave the main speech at the 2020 Democratic National Convention.
After Biden won the 2020 U.S. presidential election, many news outlets said Abrams helped greatly increase Democratic votes in Georgia. They estimated she helped register 800,000 new voters. She also served as an elector for Georgia in that election.
Running for Governor in 2022
On December 1, 2021, Abrams announced she would run for governor of Georgia again. She was the only Democratic candidate in the primary election in May 2022. She then faced Governor Brian Kemp again in the general election on November 8. Abrams lost the election to Kemp and accepted the results that night.
Political Ideas
Abrams believes that some voter ID laws make it harder for minority groups and poor people to vote. However, she does not oppose voter ID laws in general and supports voters proving their identity.
Education
Abrams wants to increase funding for public education. She does not support private school vouchers. Instead, she wants to improve public schools by:
- Making class sizes smaller.
- Hiring more school counselors.
- Protecting teacher pensions.
- Giving teachers better pay.
- Expanding early childhood education programs.
Health Care
When she ran for governor, Abrams said her main goal was to expand Medicaid. She said that expanding Medicaid helps low-income people get health care. It also helps hospitals in rural areas stay open. She also created a plan to lower Georgia's high rate of mothers dying during or after childbirth.
Writing Career
Outside of politics, Abrams is a successful fiction writer. Before 2021, she published her books under the name Selena Montgomery. She has sold over 100,000 copies of her novels. She wrote her first novel while in law school. Her legal thriller While Justice Sleeps was published in 2021 under her own name. This book is being made into a TV series.
Two of her nonfiction books, Our Time is Now and Lead from the Outside, were New York Times best sellers.
Abrams has also written articles about public policy, taxes, and nonprofit organizations. She is the author of Minority Leader: How to Lead from the Outside and Make Real Change (2018) and Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America (2020).
Honors and Awards
In 2012, Abrams received the John F. Kennedy New Frontier Award. This award honors elected officials under 40 who make a big difference in public service. In 2014, Governing Magazine named her a Public Official of the Year.
She was also recognized as one of "12 Rising Legislators to Watch" in 2012. Georgia Trend magazine named her one of the "100 Most Influential Georgians" from 2012 to 2017.
EMILY's List gave Abrams the first Gabrielle Giffords Rising Star Award in 2014. She was also chosen as an Aspen Rodel Fellow. The Root named her one of the most influential African Americans aged 25 to 45.
Abrams has received many awards from different groups. These include the Georgia Alliance of Community Hospitals, the Georgia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, and the DeKalb County Chamber of Commerce. She is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
For her work to encourage people to vote peacefully, Abrams was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. In 2021, Time magazine included her in its annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world.
In 2021, Abrams was nominated for an Emmy Award for her voice work on an election-themed episode of Black-ish.
Other Work and Activities
Abrams has served on the boards of directors for several organizations. These include the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, the Center for American Progress, and the Gateway Center for the Homeless. She also advises groups like Literacy Action and Let America Vote, which works on voting rights.
Abrams has traveled to many countries for policy work and has completed seven international fellowships. She is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations. In 2019, she wrote an essay for Foreign Affairs magazine about how different identity groups can strengthen democracy.
Abrams was featured in All In: The Fight For Democracy. This documentary is about voter suppression in the United States. In the film, she talks about her family's voting challenges and issues during her 2018 campaign.
Abrams also appeared as an actor in the TV show Star Trek: Discovery. She played the President of United Earth in the season 4 finale.
In April 2023, Howard University announced that Abrams would hold a special position there. She was appointed to the Ronald W. Walters Endowed Chair for Race and Black Politics.
Personal Life
Stacey Abrams is the second of six children born to Reverend Carolyn and Reverend Robert Abrams. Her siblings include Andrea Abrams, U.S. district judge Leslie Abrams Gardner, Richard Abrams, Walter Abrams, and Jeanine Abrams McLean.
In 2018, Abrams shared that she had some debt, including federal back taxes and credit card and student loan debt. She was repaying the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on a payment plan. She said this was needed to help with her family's medical bills. By 2019, she had paid off her back taxes and other debts.
Images for kids
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Stacey Abrams campaigning in 2018
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Stacey Abrams campaigning in 2018
See also
In Spanish: Stacey Abrams para niños
