Virginia Mega Thread: The Youngkin Administration

[Spectator]

Either 2022 really will make 2010 look like a blue wave in comparison, or this is the equivalent of Greenfield +12. Or a bit of both.

Republicans swept VA in a landslide and won NJ in 2009 and still lost several Senate races in states far less blue in 2010 (CO, NV, WV), with Democrats being competitive in WI/PA (the VA/NJ results wouldn’t have "suggested" that). It would be a devastating result for Democrats, but there’s also no need to overinterpret this — if Youngkin really does win or comes extremely close, I’d say this was a rejection of the VA Democratic Party and McAuliffe (who is objectively an awful candidate for anyone who’s not a hardcore Democrat) just as much if not more so than it was a rejection of Biden/national Dems (although the two aren’t that easy to separate at times).

Virginia is way more Democratic now and races are much more nationalized than in 2009. This would be like Republicans losing a highly nationalized race in Ohio. No way it doesn't spell trouble of biblical proportions for Democrats.

It does spell big trouble for them, but if VA is their only notable underperformance and they hold up relatively well in NJ/PA, I don’t think it would suggest a wave worse than (or even on par with) 2010. It would be a damning indictment of the VA Democratic Party and McAuliffe's campaign, though.

Doug Jones flipping AL did not foreshadow Democratic wins in TN/TX/FL/ND/IN/MO, so I wouldn’t extrapolate a "biblical wave" based on "uniform swing." Gubernatorial races might have become more nationalized, but they’re still not nearly as nationalized as Senate/presidential races.

Doug Jones flipping Alabama had nothing to do with the National environment in Alabama of all places and had everything to do with the fact he was running against a probably child predator.

[MT Treasurer]

Doug Jones flipping Alabama had nothing to do with the National environment in Alabama of all places and had everything to do with the fact he was running against a probably child predator.

It’s definitely inaccurate to claim that Jones's win had nothing to do with the environment (and anyone working on the Jones or even Moore campaign will tell you that).

[Devils30]

The Dems endless incompetence is staggering. This is what happens when you promote a bunch of idiot moron social justice types as the future and get the media to go along with it. You can thank AOC, Omar and company for the future Republican majority with 59 senators come 2025. Forget about stolen elections, Rs won't need to cheat!

[EJ24]

Youngkin +2.2, calling it now.

[Progressive Pessimist]

The Dems endless incompetence is staggering. This is what happens when you promote a bunch of idiot moron social justice types as the future and get the media to go along with it. You can thank AOC, Omar and company for the future Republican majority with 59 senators come 2025. Forget about stolen elections, Rs won't need to cheat!

Establishment darling Terry McAuliffe is a social justice type?

Lee Carter wasn't nominated here. If he was you might have had a point. I can only imagine how depressing this race would have been with him or Fairfax nominated. I can't believe that things actually could be worse. Would we have been better off with Carroll Foy?

[Skill and Chance]

The Dems endless incompetence is staggering. This is what happens when you promote a bunch of idiot moron social justice types as the future and get the media to go along with it. You can thank AOC, Omar and company for the future Republican majority with 59 senators come 2025. Forget about stolen elections, Rs won't need to cheat!

IDK about 59 senators, but Trump's winning the PV on his 3rd try if this environment continues all the way to 2024.

*However, be very, very careful about assuming that.  Imagine telling someone in 2017 that the deciding issue in the 2020 presidential election would be infectious disease management!

[Progressive Pessimist]

The Dems endless incompetence is staggering. This is what happens when you promote a bunch of idiot moron social justice types as the future and get the media to go along with it. You can thank AOC, Omar and company for the future Republican majority with 59 senators come 2025. Forget about stolen elections, Rs won't need to cheat!

IDK about 59 senators, but Trump's winning the PV on his 3rd try if this environment continues all the way to 2024.

*However, be very, very careful about assuming that.  Imagine telling someone in 2017 that the deciding issue in the 2020 presidential election would be infectious disease management!

I still don't think the GOP is going to win the popular vote anytime soon, even 2024. But if Biden falls even half a percentage from his 2020 margin, he loses.

[THG]

https://www.twitter.com/politicsmaps/status/1453852560079482882
Make what you will of this.

True, but I'm wondering if that bares out. This is the first poll to show that Biden voters are not exclusively going to T-Mac. Most polls are showing both sides with about ~95% support. This one shows way more Dem/Youngkin voters than Rep/McAuliffe voters.

I don’t know if Trump-McAuliffe voters will be a thing. Ancestral Republicans in NOVA voting Democratic is an entirely different story.

[Skill and Chance]

The Dems endless incompetence is staggering. This is what happens when you promote a bunch of idiot moron social justice types as the future and get the media to go along with it. You can thank AOC, Omar and company for the future Republican majority with 59 senators come 2025. Forget about stolen elections, Rs won't need to cheat!

Establishment darling Terry McAuliffe is a social justice type?

Lee Carter wasn't nominated here. If he was you might have had a point. I can only imagine how depressing this race would have been with him or Fairfax nominated. I can't believe that things actually could be worse. Would we have been better off with Carroll Foy?

The choice of Dem nominee probably didn't much matter (excluding Lee Carter).  What they needed was for the GOP nominee to be an Amanda Chase or Corey Stewart.

Also, this looks like another example of the "only won because their opponent was nuts" penalty.  McAuliffe barely eeked out a plurality against Ken Cucinelli, who was pushing the right wing culture war as hard as the Squad is now pushing the left wing culture war.  In retrospect, that should have set off alarm bells about renominating him for a 2nd run.    

[Ferguson97]

https://twitter.com/lxeagle17/status/1453849134885007365

[roxas11]

https://www.twitter.com/politicsmaps/status/1453852560079482882
Make what you will of this.

True, but I'm wondering if that bares out. This is the first poll to show that Biden voters are not exclusively going to T-Mac. Most polls are showing both sides with about ~95% support. This one shows way more Dem/Youngkin voters than Rep/McAuliffe voters.

I would argue this is a big reason why passing the infrastructure bill is so important

Because if these Biden voters saw that the Biden agenda that they voted for was getting passed, they may be more willing to actually support the democrat candidate.

The good news for Dems is that any poll, only represents a snapshot in time and if they do pull off passing their popular infrastructure bill in the coming days than they may get a lot of those Biden voters back

[BigSerg]

https://twitter.com/HotlineJosh/status/1453848626996949015?s=20

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

People are writing McAuliffe's obituary way too early.
He still has a sizable chance to win still. And he has a bunch of votes banked in with early voting.

[Spectator]

https://twitter.com/HotlineJosh/status/1453848626996949015?s=20

People also said Gillespie would do better than Trump in the suburbs and look what happened. People say things.

[Progressive Pessimist]

The Dems endless incompetence is staggering. This is what happens when you promote a bunch of idiot moron social justice types as the future and get the media to go along with it. You can thank AOC, Omar and company for the future Republican majority with 59 senators come 2025. Forget about stolen elections, Rs won't need to cheat!

Establishment darling Terry McAuliffe is a social justice type?

Lee Carter wasn't nominated here. If he was you might have had a point. I can only imagine how depressing this race would have been with him or Fairfax nominated. I can't believe that things actually could be worse. Would we have been better off with Carroll Foy?

The choice of Dem nominee probably didn't much matter (excluding Lee Carter).  What they needed was for the GOP nominee to be an Amanda Chase or Corey Stewart.

Also, this looks like another example of the "only won because their opponent was nuts" penalty.  McAuliffe barely eeked out a plurality against Ken Cucinelli, who was pushing the right wing culture war as hard as the Squad is now pushing the left wing culture war.  In retrospect, that should have set off alarm bells about renominating him for a 2nd run.    

I think you're right that 2013 might have been a fluke in hindsight, but the real appeal for renominating him was probably the thinking that he was a pretty successful Governor already and that Virginia is now Democratic enough where his now very clear campaigning weaknesses wouldn't matter. But that would assume that Virginians still remembered or cared about his tenure as Governor when he hasn't held the position in almost four years. Even the proverbial educated suburbanites clearly have the short-term memory curse that plagues our nation's voting populace. To quote Rick Perry: "oops!"

F*** you, Terry! You better pull this off somehow.

https://www.twitter.com/politicsmaps/status/1453852560079482882
Make what you will of this.

True, but I'm wondering if that bares out. This is the first poll to show that Biden voters are not exclusively going to T-Mac. Most polls are showing both sides with about ~95% support. This one shows way more Dem/Youngkin voters than Rep/McAuliffe voters.

I would argue this is a big reason why passing the infrastructure bill is so important

Because if these Biden voters saw that the Biden agenda that they voted for was getting passed, they may be more willing to actually support the democrat candidate.

The good news for Dems is that any poll, only represents a snapshot in time and if they do pull off passing their popular infrastructure bill in the coming days than they may get a lot of those Biden voters back

There are only five days left! And all anyone knows about the bill from what the media is telling them is that it's "stalled" and constantly getting watered down with tangible effects that won't be felt for years possibly. Boy, that sure is galvanizing!

[JustinSmith]

My model has the new FOX News poll taking off about 12,000 votes from McAuliffe and adding about 14,000 votes to Youngkin. But it's still overwhelmingly in favor of a McAuliffe win.

[Duke of York]

https://twitter.com/HotlineJosh/status/1453848626996949015?s=20

I am very pessimistic about this election. I expect to be very disappointed on Tuesday.

[Progressive Pessimist]

https://twitter.com/HotlineJosh/status/1453848626996949015?s=20

I am very pessimistic about this election. I expect to be very disappointed on Tuesday.

Exactly. I'm mentally preparing for the worse. Though on election night I will be repeating what I did last year and not watch the returns come in at all. My blood pressure can't take it. Then I'm going to start saving up for moving out of this s***hole country. I'm serious.

[BigSerg]

https://twitter.com/guypbenson/status/1453868292179959812?s=20

[roxas11]

People are writing McAuliffe's obituary way too early.
He still has a sizable chance to win still. And he has a bunch of votes banked in with early voting.

Im not wriiting McAuliffe's obituary at all

especially not based on 1 outlier poll that does not even match up with a poll that literally came out yesterday showing McAuliffe ahead by 1

The fact is, no other poll is showing results even close to this and again, not even the Trafalgar group has put out a poll like this

[Progressive Pessimist]

People are writing McAuliffe's obituary way too early.
He still has a sizable chance to win still. And he has a bunch of votes banked in with early voting.

Im not wriiting McAuliffe's obituary at all

especially not based on 1 outlier poll that does not even match up with a poll that literally came out yesterday showing McAuliffe ahead by 1

The fact is, no other poll is showing results even close to this and again, not even the Trafalgar group has put out a poll like this

Not yet. But I'm sure Trafalgar will drop something and if it's Youngkin by double digits, that will translate to him winning. However, if it's a single digit Youngkin lead, maybe there is still hope.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

People are writing McAuliffe's obituary way too early.
He still has a sizable chance to win still. And he has a bunch of votes banked in with early voting.

Im not wriiting McAuliffe's obituary at all

especially not based on 1 outlier poll that does not even match up with a poll that literally came out yesterday showing McAuliffe ahead by 1

The fact is, no other poll is showing results even close to this and again, not even the Trafalgar group has put out a poll like this

Even if the poll was accurate somehow - that might still not make it Safe Youngkin. People don't necessarily understand this, but early voting alters the dynamics of how decisive late polling swings can be.

[EJ24]

If Terry does lose, does it indicate more of a bad State and National environment for Dems or is Terry legitimately a horrible candidate?

[wbrocks67]

Besides the Loudon County middle school assault situation, what exactly is Youngkin's "message" on "education" there? The same CRT, "Parents Matter" message? Like I'm not getting what is supposed to be resonating so specifically with his message - is he just saying "I care about parents. Terry does not"?

Would love a perspective from someone who actually LIVES in VA though.

[MT Treasurer]

If Terry does lose, does it indicate more of a bad State and National environment for Dems or is Terry legitimately a horrible candidate?

"Both" is probably the safe answer here unless Democrats seriously outperform expectations in NJ (with Murphy winning by close to Biden 2020 margins)/PA or Ayala and Herring dramatically outperform McAuliffe.