As Beshear blasts politics at UK, he continues to appoint big donors to UK board
A sign on the University of Kentucky's campus signals an ongoing board meeting in April 2026. (Kentucky Lantern photo by McKenna Horsley)
FRANKFORT, Ky. – In April Gov. Andy Beshear delivered a strong warning about partisan donors exerting “undue outside influence” on the direction of the University of Kentucky.
Yet, a different kind of partisan donor – insiders – officially oversee Kentucky’s flagship state university.
They are the governors’ appointees to the UK Board of Trustees, and the amounts that UK trustees have given to advance the political career of Democrat Beshear have been both consistent and consistently generous.
The 16 people Beshear has appointed to the board – including their companies and members of their immediate families – have made 321 donations totaling $1,666,637 to Beshear’s political causes since his 2015 campaign for attorney general, according to an analysis by the Kentucky Lantern. That number continues to grow as most trustees now regularly give to a super PAC (In This Together PAC, Inc.) promoting Beshear’s exploration of a run for president in 2028.
That’s more money than the Kentucky Education Association, or Churchill Downs and its executives, or even London Mayor Randall Weddle and his family and business associates have donated to Beshear political causes over the same period.
Moreover, eight of those trustees have also hosted fundraising events for Beshear, according to records of the Kentucky Registry of Election Finance.
And the total could be higher because since his reelection in 2023 Beshear has also been raising money for a second political committee to help his ongoing presidential ambitions (Heckbent Inc.) that does not disclose the names of its donors.
Biggest donors, curious timing
The top donor among the trustees is Jim Gray, the former Lexington mayor who served as Beshear’s Transportation secretary until he took on a new role as special advisor to the governor in April. Gray has given $296,000 to Beshear political committees since 2014, according to Kentucky Lantern’s analysis.
But seven other trustees (Chairman Britt Brockman, Todd Case, Alex Bone, Robert Vance, Ron Geoghegan, Skip Berry and honorary trustee Frank Shoop) also rank among Beshear’s very biggest donors – giving time and time again over the years and rolling up totals in the six figures.
Because state law requires the board to reflect the political party breakdown of the state, Democrat Beshear must appoint many Republicans to the board. And the newer Republicans are among Beshear’s most enthusiastic recent donors.
Consider: Elizabeth McCoy, a banker from Hopkinsville, who for well over a decade has been a political donor to mostly Republicans, including to Gov. Matt Bevin, who appointed her to the UK Board of Trustees in 2017. She served until 2022.
But in the last week of April 2023, McCoy and her husband gave what online government databases of campaign contributions show was by far the largest political donation they ever made – contributions totaling $50,000 to help Beshear’s reelection.
The contributions were: $2,000 to the Beshear campaign, $30,000 to the Kentucky Democratic Party; and $18,000 to the Democratic Governors Association.
About two weeks later, Beshear appointed McCoy to the UK board.
Also in late August of 2023, online databases show that Janie Greer, executive vice president and director of the First National Bank of Manchester, and her parents combined to give $46,300 to help Beshear. ($40,000 to the Kentucky Democratic Party and $6,300 to the Beshear campaign.)
One month later, Beshear appointed Greer to the UK Board.
‘No one has been appointed because of any donation’
Beshear declined to be interviewed for this story. But Scottie Ellis, communications director for the Governor’s Office, replied to questions sent to her by Kentucky Lantern with this statement:
“Every appointment to the University of Kentucky Board of Trustees was confirmed by the Republican supermajority in the Senate. All contributions are legal, transparent and publicly reported, and no one has been appointed because of any donation. The appointees reflect regional and political diversity, and each is fully qualified and brings important experience to the board.”
Chairman Brockman has donated $175,500 to Beshear’s political causes including the donations of his immediate family members, Lantern’s analysis shows.
Brockman also declined to be interviewed, but released this statement: “I believe in Kentucky. I support people, candidates and causes I believe will advance this state. It is that simple and that is my motivation. My support of both Steve and Andy Beshear over more than a decade is an example of that. I believe that is also what motivates my colleagues on the board as well. They deeply believe in this state and want a brighter future for it. I don’t believe political contributions qualify people for appointments, nor should they disqualify them.”
For their parts, most of the trustees who donated large amounts – including McCoy and Greer – did not return phone messages from Kentucky Lantern. The Lantern did reach Shoop, Geoghegan and Lucas.
Lucas referred questions to the UK administration. Geoghegan and Shoop said they donate to Beshear because they are longtime friends and supporters of him. They said they were not trying to enhance their chances for appointment to the UK board.
Senate President Robert Stivers, a Manchester Republican, could address the issue of Senate confirmation of Beshear appointees. But Stivers declined comment for this story. House Speaker David Osborne, of Prospect, was among the Republican officials who criticized Beshear’s recent comments as unnecessarily disruptive. But Osborne also declined to comment.
The current clash
Beshear touched off the current conflict in April with a social media post saying he was losing confidence in UK’s leadership, citing two particular actions – the creation of an ill-defined job for retiring Athletics Director Mitch Barnhart that paid $1 million a year, and the appointment of U.S. District Judge Gregory Van Tatenhove as dean of the law school without full approval of the school’s faculty.
Beshear said he was worried that these decisions “are related to certain donors pushing partisan and undue influence on the university.”
Since then, Barnhart has stepped away from the new job, but President Eli Capilouto has stood firm behind Van Tatenhove’s appointment, saying that under governance changes made in 2024 the board of trustees no longer must approve the appointment of the law school dean.
At a board meeting later in April Gray won board approval for a group of university stakeholders to be appointed to review and revise governing regulations to allow for a board “vote on these kinds of appointments going forward.”
Beshear said later at a press conference, “I’m going to take a real close look at the board of trustees to make sure we’re getting real strong oversight, and they should absolutely walk back what’s claimed to be the 2024 action that moved these decisions to the president.”
‘A disturbing pattern’
Ross Mugler, chief executive of the Washington-based Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges, said trustee appointments to any state’s flagship university “are highly coveted, very sought-after.”
And Mugler says the reason goes beyond the luxury box trappings that trustees enjoy at basketball and football games.
Mugler said, “Trustee service at a flagship is widely viewed as both a significant civic responsibility and a prestigious leadership opportunity.”
And just as there is an age-old practice of presidents appointing big donors to ambassadorships, Mugler said it has long been common for governors in Kentucky and other states to appoint big donors to university boards.
But Mugler said his experience has been that these big donors have been dedicated board members.
“Most of them bring excellent leadership skills to the boardroom,” Mugler said. “I think you’ll find that 90 percent of them are doing it for the right reason.”
Some Kentucky Republicans, however, believe Beshear’s appointments of big donors have gone too far, raising the question of whether contributions are the most important qualification.
Tres Watson, a Republican political consultant from Lexington, said, “There has been – for years – a disturbing pattern in the connection between donations to Beshear political committees and his appointments to the UK board, as well as his appointments in general.”
Former Kentucky Senate Majority Leader Damon Thayer, a Georgetown Republican, said that because so many big donors have gotten appointments, “I’m convinced Andy Beshear is the most transactional governor we’ve had in 50 years.
“It’s all kind of a dirty little secret in Frankfort,” Thayer said. “For Andy Beshear to talk about the exercise of undue partisan influence – outside or inside – is pretty rich.”
The law on appointments
State law gives the governor authority to directly appoint 13 of the 20 members of the University of Kentucky Board of Trustees. The governor also appoints three alumni members, but for each of these he must pick one of the top three vote-getters in an election conducted by the alumni association.
The faculty elects two members of the board, the staff employees elect one, and the student body president serves on the board.
Currently there is one honorary trustee, longtime trustee Frank Shoop. As an honorary trustee, Shoop can participate at meetings and enjoys all perks and privileges of a trustee. But he cannot vote at meetings.
The governor’s appointments are subject to confirmation by the Kentucky State Senate.
State law also requires that the governor’s appointees to “reflect proportional representation of the two leading political parties based on the state’s voter registration.”
There are currently eight Democrats and eight Republicans among Beshear’s appointed trustees. That does not include Shoop or the student, faculty and staff appointees.
The law also requires that the governor’s appointees “no less than proportional representation of the minority racial composition of the Commonwealth based on the total minority racial population.”
The Lantern’s analysis showed alumni trustees have given just $1,050 to Beshear causes. The current faculty, staff and student donors have not contributed.
Many ways to give to Beshear
Beshear has raised so much money from appointees – and apparently so much more than previous governors – largely because he has been raising money for a long time and for much more than just his three successful campaigns for statewide office.
He began fundraising in 2013 while his father Steve Beshear was governor with a goal of winning election in 2015 for attorney general. He built up an early war chest (on contributions limited at that time by state law to $1,000 per person) that scared off serious opposition in the Democratic primary of 2015 and won the general election by a razor-thin margin.
Then came his win in the 2019 primary for governor. After that, Beshear became the leader of the Kentucky Democratic Party which has raised money to help Beshear through his narrow win in the 2019 governor’s race and a more comfortable reelection in 2023.
Well-heeled donors, corporations and labor unions have also had legal avenues to give contributions of unlimited amounts to Beshear: to the Democratic Governors Association, to super PACs running independent campaigns for Beshear’s elections, to committees that paid for his inaugural ceremonies.
A month after his 2023 reelection Beshear formed the two committees – In This Together and Heckbent – which have been raising money ever since.
Nine of the current UK trustees have consistently donated to Beshear for the entire journey – starting with donations to the attorney general’s race through recent contributions to In This Together.
Comparison to Bevin
Republican Matt Bevin got little or no contributions from 11 of the 12 persons he named to the UK Board. Kentucky Lantern found those 11 combined to give less than $30,000 to Bevin’s two campaigns for governor and to the Republican Party of Kentucky between May of 2015 and December of 2019.
The one exception was a huge one – Kelly Craft, appointed by Bevin as a UK trustee in August of 2016.
Craft is the wife of billionaire coal magnate and longtime UK benefactor Joe Craft, who appears to be the target of Beshear’s concerns about outside donors having out-sized influence at UK.
Their financial support for Bevin’s gubernatorial campaigns was extensive and included hosting a big fundraiser in 2015 after Bevin won an upset victory in the Republican primary for governor and hosting two more fundraisers for Bevin in 2019, Kentucky Registry of Election Finance records show. Executives and employees of Craft’s Alliance Coal showered bundles of small contributions totaling $100,000 to Bevin’s two campaigns. Joe Craft and entities he heads (including Alliance Coal and JWC III Revocable Trust) gave more than $700,000 to the Republican Governors Association in the two years Bevin ran for Kentucky governor.
Kelly Craft served as a UK trustee for about 14 months, resigning after President Trump appointed her as U.S. ambassador to Canada.
But any comparison of Beshear and Bevin contributions comes with some caveats. First, Beshear has been raising money for a much longer period of time (for three statewide campaigns compared to two for Bevin) and for many more political committees that support his political career. Second, Bevin was in office making appointments for four years, while Beshear has been governor for six and a half years. Finally, Bevin self-funded a significant portion of his two campaigns for governor.
About Kentucky Lantern’s analysis:
Sources: Federal Election Commission website, Kentucky Registry of Election website, Internal Revenue Service website for contributions to political organizations. ProPublica’s online “527 Explorer” was invaluable in helping the search for contributions to political organizations that report to the IRS.
Process: The list of contributions represents the best effort by Kentucky Lantern to search the sources listed above for contributions by Beshear’s appointees to the University of Kentucky Board of Trustees (and their identifiable immediate relatives and companies) to political committees that have advanced Andy Beshear’s political career. Those committee’s are: Beshear’s 2015 campaign for attorney general; Beshear’s 2019 campaign for governor; Beshear’s campaign for governor in 2023; the Kentucky Democratic Party since May of 2019; Beshear’s super PAC In This Together; the Democratic Governors Association in 2015 and in 2023 to present; super PACs that backed Beshear’s 2019 and 2023 campaigns for governor (Bluegrass Values, Defending Bluegrass Values, and Kentucky Family Values); Beshear’s inauguration committees in 2109 and 2023; Democratic Grassroots Victory Fund in 2023; and a small PAC that backed Beshear in 2019 called Bluegrass Committee for Progress.
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