November’s winner will make history as Virginia’s first female governor: Democrat Abigail Spanburger or GOP’s charming Earlseals
Check out Governor Glen Youngkin’s full Republican National Convention speech
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin gave a speech at the 2024 Republican National Convention.
The Virginian is heading for the polls in one of this year’s banner election battles, where President Donald Trump’s name is not on the ballot, but his second term policy is at the top of voters’ minds.
Most importantly of the June 17 primary race will be the one who will become the next governor of Old Dominion, a state that has narrowed its share of federal labor in the hands of Trump and former Doge leader Elon Musk.
Virginia’s expected major party candidates — former Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger and Republican Lt. Col. Wynn Earl Shears — are not opposed in their respective primary elections and are preparing for the general election race for the next five months. Anyone who wins will make history as Virginia’s first female governor.
Nationwide, Politicos will pay close attention to results in both Virginia and New Jersey. This is two states that host governors’ contests that take advantage of voter moods in strange years after the presidential election and before the midterm.
Parties that are particularly opposed to those currently in the White House have a history of beating the Virginia Governor’s mansion and have the right to serve a single non-term. In the 12 governor races over the past 50 years, the same party candidate won by the seat president who won Virginia only once, which won in November 2013.
Governor’s race set
Of the six primary races across the state in Virginia, only two feature multiple candidates in the June 17 poll.
Republicans have long had a candidate for governor of Earl Thurs, the first 61-year-old woman to hold a statewide office in Virginia. She locked her place in after her sole competitor, former state senator Amanda Chase, was unable to get enough signatures to qualify for the vote.
Similarly, the GOP already knows that the November general election candidate is for conservative radio host John Reed and current Attorney General Jason Miyares.
The Democrats are on the same boat for the governor. The 45-year-old Spanburger secured her spot on April 3rd as no other candidates appeared before the filing deadline for the day. A former CIA officer who served three terms in Congress, Spanberger has built a reputation with Capitol Hill as a moderate member of the Centrist “Blue Dog” coalition.
Professor David Richards, chairman of the Faculty of Political Science at Lynchburg University, said early jumps and prolific fundraising to the campaign from November 2023 to November 2023 may have given the benefits that potential challengers need to even try.
“It became clear that if you were trying her out, it would be very difficult,” Richards said.
Earl Sears has long been a advantage among Republicans as second place under incumbent GOP Governor Glenn Youngkin, who is unable to serve consecutive terms due to Virginia’s unique law. Her only competitive blip came from Chase. Chase charged himself with “playing on the heels” and challenged Earl Thurs to say he wasn’t enough Magazine to get a GOP nomination.
Federal workers’ flashpoint
Virginia Democrats hope Trump’s decision, next door to Washington, D.C., will help them prefer them in the state’s elections – especially his cuts to the federal workforce.
Mostly at Musk’s direction, the Trump administration has sought to remove tens of thousands of government officials from the start of his second term. The move is felt in the US, but Virginia stands out with more than 140,000 federal employees who called out to the Commonwealth home at the end of 2024.
“I know that the economy of Virginia, our national health, is intricately tied to the good work that many people working in the Library of Congress’s IRS (Veteran Affairs Bureau) across the government.” “As governor, I stand up not only for individuals who focus on serving our country in their daily work, but for our entire economy as well.”
Republicans refute that it is a popular brand that will help Trump win in November.
“Democrats use the same playbook. They hope that President Trump will once again burn bases and divert voters from state-level failures,” Edith Jorge Tuneen, president of the Republican State Leadership Committee, wrote in a June 2nd Wall Street Journal opinion paper. “But this time, Republicans are ready and we’re attacking.”
Trump as the protagonist of the Democratic AG race
Trump’s name has appeared regularly in Virginia primary, becoming a candidate for Democratic Attorney General, and the winner took part in a general election contest with Miyares in November.
Two key candidates, former state lawmakers Jay Jones and Shannon Taylor, a federal lawyer in Henrico County, have created a version of the promise of the campaign, “Stay against Trump” if selected as Virginia’s top legal officials.
If successful, they will quickly join other Democrats attorney generals who have spent the past few months filing ongoing lawsuits against Trump and his administration, including those related to cuts in the federal workforce.
Trump has cornered other state attorney generals for a similar campaign, calling for political persecution of their scrutiny. This is the argument that Virginia Republicans are planning to push Democrats into the fall.
“The law is a shield, not a sword to use against political enemies,” Miyares spokesman Alex Cofield told USA Today. “If they think that’s the role of this office, it’s no wonder why their policies continue to be rejected by voters. We look forward to the contrast in November.”
