She’s Alabama’s longest continually serving governor. And her party is ignoring her.

Gov. Kay Ivey released her farewell video last week.

Her office didn’t bill it that way. But it had all the beats of a political goodbye. Slow piano music? Check. Nonstop lectern appearances? You got ‘em. Lots of waving and finally walking away? Oh yeah.

One would expect a production like this in December or January, when Alabama’s longest continually serving governor leaves office. Not in August, when Ivey still has five months on the clock.

But it made me realize that I hadn’t thought of Kay Ivey in some time. And her party seems to be forgetting her, too.  

This shouldn’t be the case. Polling in Alabama is tricky, but in Morning Consult surveys, Ivey has consistently ranked among the nation’s more popular governors. In a potentially dire election year, the GOP should be clinging to Ivey and talking her up more than President Donald Trump, whose popularity in Alabama is tanking.

But Trump still dominates the TV ads. Alabama Republicans still beseech the president for his blessings. Scan the campaign literature for any major GOP nominee in the state, and you’ll see far more about the unpopular president than the ostensibly popular governor.

Ivey received an award and a warm reception from the Alabama Republican Party at their summer meeting late last month. But in speeches designed to fire up Republicans for the fall, neither U.S. Sen. Katie Britt nor Sen. Tommy Tuberville, the GOP nominee for governor, said much about Ivey.

In fact, you might think Tuberville was running against Ivey’s record. He says he’ll give Alabamians a “better life.” His campaign manager promises to “clean up” Montgomery, a klutzy statement about a Republican government with a GOP governor reelected twice in the last 10 years.

This is one way to explain Ivey’s absence from the campaign. Like other Alabama Republicans, the Republican gubernatorial nominee shows little interest in Alabama. GOP candidates boast of their servility to Trump. Every election features at least one cowardly attack on a group of Americans — immigrants, Muslims or transgender people — who do not cause problems and have a minuscule presence in the state. It’s malicious but generic, easily duplicated in any southern state. And disconnected from our actual problems.

Ivey has indulged in this garbage as well. But it means that the economic development she clearly values — and which her farewell video repeatedly highlights — carries little weight with Republicans. They want grievance, not progress.

All those shots of shovels and besuited executives also remind you of how uncomfortable the governor looks outside controlled environments. In three minutes, you see Ivey among politicians at State of the State addresses, or behind tables with politicians signing bills, or under tents with CEOs.

What you don’t see until near the end is Ivey interacting with people who have never been inside a C-Suite. And even then, it’s only three of them, each meeting the governor in seemingly deserted spaces.

It’s unusual to have a politician this uneasy with the public. But Ivey and her staff work hard to avoid us. I last saw her in person at Higher Education Day at the Alabama State Capitol in February. She walked into a tent, waved, gave a speech and walked back out. Minimum handshaking, little if any small talk and no questions from the press.

Or there was the time in 2022 when Ivey emerged from an unexplained three-week retreat from public view to tour a Montgomery school. She visited classrooms and politely observed the projects of the students, but said almost nothing to them.

So I’m not expecting Ivey to lead Obama-style rallies this fall. But I can’t say she’s a popular governor. If she is, it’s a strange, passive popularity, less about Ivey herself than being the first name on the Republican ballot. The governor invites neither derision nor devotion. She’s just kind of there.

And she’s rarely out campaigning with the GOP, building up the political connections and favors of a long-serving governor. Whether Republicans want to invoke Ivey’s name, most of them don’t need to.

It’s hard to judge the legacy of an Alabama governor. The Legislature calls the shots in state government. When governors screw up, it’s usually because they fail to understand who holds the cards.

Ivey understood her limits. Like other governors, she turned to groundbreakings and ribbon-cuttings to project authority. I have major issues with many of her decisions, particularly her handling of the prison crisis. But from a tactical standpoint, you can see the GOP pointing to Ivey’s time in office as an argument for continuity and keeping them in charge. They’re not. They’re turning to Trump and national issues as they turn their backs on Ivey.

Which is an odd ending for a governor whose 10 straight years in office may never be matched. Ivey managed to stay afloat on Alabama’s conservative currents. Now they’re washing her away, and no one seems to notice.