It is a big defeat for Joe Biden in Virginia. He had won the state in the presidential election against Trump with a 10% margin. It’s all gone. Republicans last won the gubernational elections in 2009. And President Biden predicted the Democrat Terry McAuliffe (*1957) to win. It did not materialize.
In addition, the Republican candidate Winsome Sears managed to win the lieutenant governor’s race. She is Virginia’s first female lieutenant governor and the first woman of color elected to statewide office in Virginia.
The Republican Glenn Youngkin (*1966), a former CEO of the private equity Carlyle Group, manages to defeat Democrat Terry McAuliffe, a former Virginia governor (2014-2018) and a former chairman of the Democratic National Committee (2001-2005), to become Virginia’s next governor. Virginia flipps from blue to red. A bad sign for President Biden ahead of the 2022 midterm election.
According to polls, people in Virginia were mainly worried about the state of the economy, about the COVID-19 pandemic as well as about education. Terry McAuliffe said during the electoral campaign, “parents should not be telling schools what to teach”. He made it an issue. It did not go down well with voters. Glenn Youngkin promised to ban “critical race theory” from Virginia public schools, something that is not being taught now anyway.
Terry McAuliffe tried to paint Glenn Youngkin as Virginia’s Donald Trump. It did not stick. Many observers painted him as “Trump Lite”. It took Youngkin month’s to admit that Trump had lost the 2020 election. Youngkin accepted Trump’s endorsement, but never campaigned in person with the former president. He did however appear together with former vice-president Mike Pence in August.
At the beginning of 2021, Glenn Youngkin was virtually unknown to voters in Virginia. Thanks to deep pockets (Forbes estimation in 2021: $440 million fortune), he managed to run a successful advertising campaign, painting a positive picture of himself, which stuck with many voters.
Anyway, it probably mattered more that Joe Biden is currently unpopular. At the end of October 2021, his job approval rating sank to 42%, and 71% of Americans said that the country was moving in the wrong direction. It did not help Terry McAucliffe that both President Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris came to Virginia to campaign in person with him. Last, but not least, in Virginia live some 600,000 veterans who feel betrayed by Biden’s disastrous retreat from Afghanistan.
For Joe Biden, it will be key to pass the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act or a similar bill to save his presidency.
P.S. Youngkin’s underage son tried to vote twice in the Virginia election. He was turned away twice. Who knows, had he been able to vote and had his father lost, Glenn Youngkin may have contested the election as fraudulent.
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Photo of Glenn Youngkin in 2021 by Kate Magee Joyce. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Glenn_Youngkin_Headshot.jpg
Article added on November 3, 2021 at 13:14 Swiss time. Last update on November 5, 2021 at 20:20 Swiss time: 600,000 veterans in Virginia feel betrayed by Biden (found via Nicole Bacharan). Last update on November 6, 2021 at 14:06: Youngkin’s underage son tried to vote twice.
