Virginia

Does Abigail Spanberger want you to be fat and crazy?

Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis coined the phrase “laboratories of democracy” to describe how individual states could act as test cases for different policies and ideas. Judging by its recent track record, Virginia aspires to be the Wuhan Institute of Virology. In November, voters of the Commonwealth elected Governor Abigail Spanberger – a so-called “Blue Dog Democrat” who used to serve in the CIA and railed against socialism and calls to “defund the police” after the Democrats underperformed in the 2020 elections. Virginia Democrats also retained control of the state’s Senate and House.

Virginia referendum loss adds to Trump’s woes

In 2020 Donald Trump became the first Republican presidential candidate to lose Virginia twice since William Howard Taft. Then in 2024 Trump lost once more, this time to Kamala Harris. Now he has in effect lost it a fourth time as Virginia voters approved on Tuesday a fiercely contested referendum redrawing congressional districts to favor Democratic congressional candidates in the 2026 midterm elections. "This is really a country election. The whole country is watching," Trump said. If so, it watched Trump suffer a major blow – one that will prompt renewed questions about his political acuity and judgment.

Virginia

Muzzleloader season

Climbing into the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia with a muzzleloader slung over my shoulder was a journey back in time. This was the gun that the colony's first settlers used when they too trod the same ground 400 years ago to hunt deer and bear. It helped tame the state and then the entire country. As I pushed my way through undergrowth at the base of the mountain range by the light of the moon at 5 a.m. on a bitingly cold and bitter January morning, unseen branches and briars clawed at my face in the dark. This was the last day of the hunting season that had been extended – as hunting seasons across the US often are – for muzzleloaders. To keep this heritage weapon alive and to give the animals a sporting chance.

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Can Spanberger offer Virginia more than vague platitudes?

Abigail Spanberger’s victory in the Virginia gubernatorial election should come as no surprise. In the last 50 years, the state has only once elected a governor who belongs to the same party as the president. While the outcome might not be out of the ordinary, it doesn’t bode well for the Republican party in next year’s midterms – Spanberger won by a 15-point lead, much wider than the two-point margin of the 2021 race. Spanberger is a former CIA officer who served three terms in Congress. Her opponent Winsome Earle-Sears has served as Virginia’s lieutenant governor since 2021, but failed to connect with voters in the way that Virginia’s incumbent Governor Glenn Youngkin did.

What to expect from today’s elections

Americans head to the polls today, with gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey and mayoral elections in New York City and Minneapolis. The races are being talked of as an early test for Trump, a bellwether for the public mood after a breakneck ten months back in the Oval. A qualifying remark. Each of these races are taking place in traditionally blue cities and states – Virginia has not voted for a GOP presidential candidate since 2004; New Jersey since 1988; Minnesota since 1972. Still, these places – even New York – trended strongly purple at the last election; in this sense, today’s elections will be a test of the so-called “vibe-shift" and its extent.

New York

Is the Virginia election a referendum on Trump?

The Virginia state elections had looked predictable. Nearly every poll showed the Democrats poised to win all three executive offices of governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general. Then, a series of violent texts from the Democratic candidate for attorney general surfaced. In 2022, then-delegate Jay Jones had texted his Republican colleague Carrie Coyner saying that if he had a gun and two bullets, in a room with Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot and then-Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert, he’d shoot Gilbert twice. Then he called Coyner to say he wanted Gilbert’s wife to watch their children die in her arms.  Coyner expressed her horror over text. But Jones kept going: “Yes, I’ve told you this before. Only when people feel pain personally do they move on policy”.

Where Trump’s Washington will actually be hanging out

Where will conservatives and Donald Trump's disciples spend their non-working hours in DC for the president-elect’s term? The Washingtonian provided a list by Jessica Sidman last week, but by Cockburn’s estimation, it’s not totally over the target. Contenders on Sidman’s list include the Big Board, Cafe Milano, Capital Grille, Dirty Water, RPM Italian, Royal Sands Social Club, Shelly’s Back Room and the Waldorf Astoria — which used to be the Trump Hotel DC but was sold back in 2021. Shelly’s is Cockburn-approved, especially for the cigar smokers. Rudy Giuliani has been spotted in there before. But Cafe Milano, Capital Grille and Dirty Water are not necessarily “hangouts” for conservatives or the MAGA crowd in particular.

washington trump

Thunderdome is finally upon us

Welcome to Thunderdome and Happy Halloween — where this scary, chaotic, insane election season is finally coming to a close. You can hear my take on where things stand here. Election Day should come as a moment of relief to finally have some resolution. Instead, many voters worried about what comes next resemble nothing so much as Douglas Adams’s infamous bowl of petunias, falling rapidly out of the sky: “Oh no, not again.”Why do they feel that way?

Old texts and Bacon’s Castle: a walk through Virginia history

You will find Bacon’s Castle amid the flat tobacco and peanut fields in Surry County, Virginia, across the James River from Jamestown, if not quite a “castle” then certainly a very fine Jacobean mansion and the oldest brick dwelling in America. When I first visited this part of the Tidewater in 1958, I was ten and Jamestown, the year before, had turned 350. Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip came to crown the anniversary, and replicas of the three ships that brought the first English here in 1607 — Susan Constant, Godspeed and Discovery — were tied up in perpetuity at Jamestown. I came on a field trip with my schoolmates to take in the sights and something of the history of the place and of Colonial Williamsburg, just up the road. Bacon’s Castle was not on our itinerary.

Virginia

Behind Justice Alito’s war with his progressive neighbors

“Somebody in a position of authority needs to talk to her and make her stop,” complained a thirty-six-year-old man to a Fairfax County, Virginia, officer on the line, according to a recording reviewed by the New York Times. The alleged perp here? Martha-Ann Alito, wife of conservative Supreme Court justice Samuel Alito. Like Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife Virginia, Martha-Ann is now all over the news, with progressive activists ready to use her to discredit her husband’s rulings. Earlier this month, the Times reported the Alito household had flown an upside-down Old Glory flag at their Virginia home. The US flag code states that the flag ought not to be inverted “except as a signal of dire distress in instance of extreme danger to life or property.

Alito

Appalachia’s stalled revival

State officials and nonprofit leaders often chatter about economic diversification and a just transition for Appalachia. But old habits die hard. Many still dream of large factories and firms returning to the region, bringing economic wealth — and tax revenue.  The divide between smokestack chasers and economic diversifiers has an extra urgency as the federal government directs more money into the region than they have in decades. But the diversification versus big business divide threatens to squander the money from federal legislation like the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.  Swinging for the fences promises the revival of a golden era, when Appalachia was dotted with coal mines and factories.

appalachia

Is Donald J. Trump International Airport on the horizon?

As the 2024 presidential election picks up steam, so is the race to kiss up to the presumptive GOP nominee. The battleground has taken to the sky as seven Republican House members push to rename DC’s international airport to Donald J. Trump International Airport.  Representative Guy Reschenthaler, the House GOP's chief deputy whip, introduced a two-page bill to rename the Washington Dulles International Airport after the former president on Friday.  "In my lifetime, our nation has never been greater than under the leadership of President Donald J. Trump," Reschenthaler told Fox News.

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Donald Trump dominant on Super Tuesday

Donald Trump is cleaning up in the Republican primaries on Super Tuesday. The 45th president has secured victories in Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah and Virginia. Nikki Haley's sole victory is in Vermont. President Biden also bagged easy wins in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont and Virginia. The Democrats also held caucuses in American Samoa and Iowa on Tuesday. Biden won Iowa with 91 percent of the vote, but lost American Samoa to unknown businessman Jason Palmer.

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super tuesday

Four things to keep an eye on Super Tuesday

Today is Super Tuesday, when sixteen states and one territory cast ballots in presidential primaries and caucuses throughout the country. More than a third of all delegates are set to be awarded. Traditionally, Super Tuesday has served as an ender of campaigns, giving a clear indication of which two candidates will move forward to the general election. This time around, there are little doubts of who each of the party’s nominees will be. Still, there are other significant trends worth keeping an eye on.  1. Will uncommitted voters show up and scare Biden? “Uncommitted” voters showed up in droves last week in Michigan, casting over 100,000 protest ballots.

Sports: the latest victim of DC’s crimewave

The announcement this morning by owner Ted Leonsis that Washington, DC is losing the Washington Capitals and Wizards franchises to Virginia is the ultimate indictment of incompetent Mayor Muriel Bowser and corrupt Democrats on the city council who let crime take over the nation’s capital. To say DC has a rampant crime problem is an understatement. You may already have heard about the incredible rise in carjacking, which more than doubled year over year – with juvenile offenders accounting for the vast majority of arrests. All crime is up by almost a third, violent crime is up almost 40 percent and total homicides passed 200 in September, earlier in the year than it has since 1997.

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Normal wins elections

Republicans nationwide are picking up the pieces after a disappointing election night. A much vaunted, Glenn Youngkin-fronted effort to take full control of the Virginia General Assembly failed devastatingly, as the Democrats held onto the State Senate and flipped the House of Delegates. In Kentucky, incumbent Governor Andy Beshear held off a challenge from Attorney General Daniel Cameron. And in Ohio, voters opted to enshrine the right to an abortion and legalize marijuana, both by a margin of thirteen percentage points. Virginia Republicans pulled off a shock upset in 2021 when they took the House of Delegates and the governor’s mansion. The lanky quarterzip-wearing Carlyle Group executive picked key wedge issues that turned moderate heads.

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Youngkin responds to ‘vote-buying’ accusations from Democrats

Bristow, Virginia Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin responded to recent accusations from Democrats that he is attempting to buy votes by sending out tax rebates ahead of the 2023 statewide elections. “Had [Democrats] not delayed the budget for seven months, then the tax checks would have gone out a long time ago,” Youngkin told The Spectator during a press gaggle at Piney Branch Elementary School. The governor dropped by multiple polling locations on Tuesday to speak to election volunteers and voters. NBC News reported last week that “the state of Virginia is sending out tax rebate checks to qualified residents, just days before the state’s 2023 General Assembly elections.

Governor Glenn Youngkin (Photo: Amber Duke)

The truth about a Virginia house candidate’s porn scandal

If you've been reading the mainstream headlines about a recent pornography scandal in a Virginia state election, you might be under the impression that Republicans have collectively committed sex crimes against a Democratic female candidate. An Associated Press article claimed in a headline that the GOP "leak[ed]" online videos of Susanna Gibson, a House of Delegates candidate for Virginia's 57th district, having sex with her husband. "Virginia election candidate responds after leak of tapes showing her performing sex acts with husband," said CBS News. The worst offender was the New York Times, which ran with the headline, "State House Candidate in Virginia Condemns Leak of Sex Tapes.

susanna gibson porn virginia

The Youngkin blueprint

Virginia Beach, Virginia “Please run. We need you to save our country. Please.” A man pleads with Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin, referring to speculation that Youngkin may jump into the 2024 GOP presidential primary — and that Republican donors are encouraging him to do so. Youngkin responds, with a laugh: “I’m busy.” The governor is, indeed, quite busy. It is late August and he has just finished up one of his “Parents Matter” listening sessions, this one in Virginia Beach. Youngkin has been traveling the Commonwealth and hearing directly from parents to fulfill one of his biggest 2021 campaign promises: protecting the rights of parents from government overreach in matters concerning their children.

Youngkin

In defense of Susanna Gibson, the camgirl running for the Virginia House of Delegates

Susanna Gibson isn’t your average suburban mom of two. The forty-year-old nurse practitioner is running for a seat in Virginia’s House of Delegates. But before that, she was earning tips by performing online sex with her husband, on her account called the “Hotwifeexperience.”   As recently as last year, Gibson was live-streaming videos of herself and her husband to the website Chaturbate where she encourages viewers to pay her tokens for incrementally flagrant acts to, she jokes in one clip, “raise money for a good cause.” Cockburn doubts this is the most undignified thing a candidate has done for donations. It sure is a lot livelier than Doug Burgum’s giftcard scheme to qualify for the GOP debate stage.

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