Senate

Stacey Abrams tells Hillary Clinton she relaxed for 14 minutes after election

Former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, who has been receiving widespread praise for her efforts to fight voter suppression after this month’s elections, said that she probably relaxed for around “14 minutes” on Sunday after the presidential race was called before getting back to work.

The comment came during the voting rights activists’ appearance on an episode of Hillary Clinton’s “You and Me Both” podcast released Tuesday, when the former secretary of State asked Abrams if she had taken any time to rest recently. 

{mosads}“Well, I think all of us are going to be following your lead once again, because we have a few short weeks to try to continue this positive movement that Georgia has demonstrated,” Clinton said at one point during the show, as the two discussed President-elect Joe Biden’s lead in Georgia and the coming Senate runoff elections in the state in January.

“You know, Stacey, I know how busy you are. You’ve been rallying the troops, thanking people for everything that they’ve done. Have you had a minute just to sit back and take it in, put your feet up, relax at all?” Clinton asked. 

“I think I had like 14 minutes on Sunday,” Abrams said to laughs from Clinton. “But we’ve got some work to do.”

Abrams has surged to the national spotlight in the past week for efforts she and her Fair Fight initiative have made in Georgia and other states to tackle voter suppression and promote voter turnout as Biden has holds small lead over President Trump in the Peach State, which hasn’t voted for a Democratic presidential candidate since 1992.

The former vice president leads in Georgia by more than 12,000 votes, but the race has yet to be called.

Abrams has also been raising money to help support Democrats in Georgia ahead of the state’s pivotal Senate runoff elections by way of her Fair Fight Action group.

The winners of the two Senate races will decide which party gets control of the upper chamber in Congress.

Abrams set her sights on combatting voter suppression with her multistate effort after expressing concerns about the issue in Georgia in her own tight race against then-Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp (R) in 2018. 

During her appearance on Clinton’s podcast Tuesday, Abrams, who also previously served as the minority leader in the Georgia state House, discussed the two runoff elections in Georgia and urged listeners to help support Rev. Raphael Warnock, who is challenging Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.), and Jon Ossoff, who is seeks to unseat Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.).

“Those two races are both essential in their own right,” Abrams said, “and they are working together — which is so critical.”

Abrams asked listeners to donate to her Fair Fight effort to contribute to both candidates, saying Republicans “noticed that we had an incredible infrastructure for voter turnout and for getting those ballots in.”

“I have no reason to believe they’re going to let it continue the way it is, so we need the resources so we can fight back and protect the,” she said, while also asking listeners to sign up to volunteer for organization.

“We can have access to healthcare, access to justice, and access to jobs. Those are the three things that are most essential. These are the two men who will get it done if we do our part and we don’t relax, we don’t relent and we do everything to push them over the finish line on January 5th,” she said in her pitch.