President Jimmy Carter campaigns with Stacey Abrams in his hometown

SUMTER COUNTY, Ga. — Hospitals are disappearing from rural Georgia and that problem is becoming one of the biggest issues in the governor's race.

Former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, campaigned Tuesday with Democrat Stacey Abrams in Plains as she unveiled her rural health care platform.

The former president appeared with Abrams in his hometown of Plains to discuss what the campaign calls “the importance of supporting rural medical facilities and rural health care professionals across Georgia.”

Abrams faces Republican Brian Kemp in the November race for governor and has made expanding Medicaid and shoring up the struggling network of rural hospitals a central part of her campaign.

"But more than provide access to physical health care, Medicaid expansion creates 56,00o jobs in the state of Georgia, 60 percent of which are outside metro Atlanta," she said.

Kemp, the secretary of state, opposes expanding Medicaid but has left the door open to applying for waivers that he said would help stabilize insurance premiums.

"I have a broad plan that I put out over a year ago to strengthen rural Georgia," Kemp said. "When you have populations declining in rural Georgia, it’s hard to support a hospital. It’s hard to support your kids that are coming out of the school systems there when good employment and the ability to stay in their local communities."

Carter disagrees and believes Abrams’ plan is the way to get health care back to rural Georgia.

"Stacey’s absolutely sure that she can put forward her full proposal on Medicaid into effect when she gets elected," he said.

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Carter endorsed Abrams' campaign for governor in August, becoming the third U.S. president to wade into the race.

Barack Obama has also given Abrams his full-throated support, while Republican President Donald Trump endorsed Kemp six days before the July GOP runoff.

Carter’s grandson, Jason, the party’s 2014 nominee, also endorsed Abrams after staying on the sidelines during the primary.

Virtually all of the state party’s leading figures -- and many of her party’s 2020 presidential hopefuls -- have publicly backed Abrams.

So have Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, the two leading Democrats in the 2016 contest.

Ex-President Bill Clinton has yet to weigh in on the race, though one of his top advisers backed her rival in the primary.

Abrams hopes her progressive policies will mobilize a legion of left-leaning voters, many of them minorities, who rarely cast ballots.

Since locking up her party’s nomination, she’s traveled the state, highlighting what she calls “solvable problems” and touting her education and economic plan.

Kemp has steadily tried to move toward the political center with a more nuanced approach to the “religious liberty” debate while also stepping up his appeal to the party’s conservative base by highlighting his anti-gang crackdown.

Greg Bluestein, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, contributed to this report.

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