Do we like them?

Do we like Kay Ivey?

Our score: 2 out of 10. She signed bill after bill restricting trans Alabamians, with some real but modest public-service work set against it.

Kay Ivey is a Republican from Camden, Alabama, who worked her way up through state office before landing the top job. She became governor in April 2017 and won again in 2018 and 2022. She is term-limited, so 2026 has been her farewell lap, with a final State of the State address in January.

The harm check is where this gets ugly. In 2021 she signed a ban on trans girls in school sports, and in 2022 she signed a law making gender-affirming care for minors a felony, plus a bathroom bill. In 2023 she extended the sports ban to college teams, and in 2025 she signed the so-called What is a Woman Act, which LGBTQ+ advocacy groups called a targeted attack on trans and nonbinary Alabamians. She and her supporters frame these as fairness and sex-based distinctions; critics call them discriminatory.

It's not just trans issues. In 2019 she signed one of the strictest abortion bans in the country, invoking God as she did it, and even Donald Trump suggested it went too far. In 2022 her campaign ran an ad that echoed Trump's claims that the election was stolen, according to reporting at the time. In December 2024 she joined 25 Republican governors backing Trump's immigration policies.

The latest stoush is redistricting. This year she called a special session that could delay primaries so Alabama might redraw its maps after a US Supreme Court decision. Voting rights groups slammed it as an attempt to weaken Black voters' influence, while the state's leaders argue the court ruling gives them room to redraw.

In the nice column there is something. She committed $1.2 million to a statewide flood notification system, and her office points out Alabama has not declared budget proration while she has been in charge. Against that, she sacked the state veterans affairs commissioner in 2024 after his board refused her request, and he has since sued her, alleging wrongful termination.

So the call is a no. She can be a pleasant face for Alabama, but the pattern of signing laws against trans people is hers, repeated over five years. Admirers of a steady, no-drama governor will see it differently; for this page, that record is the deal-breaker.