Stacey Abrams meets with top Democrats about 2020 Senate run

Stacey Abrams, the former Democratic gubernatorial nominee in Georgia, met with top Senate Democrats this week to discuss a possible challenge to Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) in 2020.

Abrams met separately with Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), the chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, in Washington on Thursday, according to two Democratic aides.

{mosads}Abrams narrowly lost her bid for the Georgia governor’s mansion to Republican Brian Kemp in November after a drawn out vote count that spurred multiple lawsuits and accusations of intentional voter suppression.

She ended her campaign more than a week after Election Day, saying that there was “no legal path forward” in her race against Kemp.

Since then, speculation has swirled that Abrams could mount a Senate bid or even a run for the White House in 2020.

She said in an interview with public radio station WABE in Atlanta on Monday that she would announce a decision on her political future by the end of March, floating the possibility of a Senate campaign or another run for the governor’s mansion in 2022.

“I need to make decisions not based on animus or bitterness or sadness, but really based in a pragmatism that says, ‘This is the right thing to do,’ ” Abrams said. “And I’m going to use that calculus and I intend to make a decision about the job I’m going to run for next by the end of March.”

If she enters the 2020 Senate race in Georgia, Abrams would likely have an advantage over other Democrats weighing a run. She has almost universal name recognition in her state, as well as a sweeping national profile.

Abrams has also shown herself to be an adept fundraiser. Her gubernatorial campaign raised roughly $2 million between Election Day and Nov. 16, when she formally ended her bid. She ended the year with just $240,000 in cash on hand, but that was after transferring $1 million to her voting rights group, Fair Fight Action.

Perdue, a former CEO of Dollar General and Reebok, won his first term in the Senate in 2014, a notably good year for Republicans, campaigning as a political outsider. He’s likely to start the 2020 election cycle with a solid amount of cash in his campaign coffers. Perdue’s latest federal filings show his campaign with nearly $1.2 million in cash on hand.

But Democrats, fresh off a midterm election cycle that saw them capture a majority in the House, are bullish about their chances of retaking control of the Senate in 2020, when Republicans will have to defend nearly two dozen seats.

The GOP currently holds a 53-47 majority in the Senate, meaning Democrats must have a net gain of at least four seats in 2020 to win control of the chamber.

Reid Wilson contributed to this report.