Sorry, But Abigail Spanberger Isn’t The Wave… She’s The Driftwood Getting A Free Ride

A Lucky Blue Dog In A Blue Wave

Virginia’s been trending blue— Biden beat Trump 54-44%— but the last year, along came Kamala Harris to turn the trend around. Trump still lost, but not because of her. She wound up with an anemic 51.8% to his 46%. Trump’s horrendous performance in a handful of high population constituencies, like Fairfax County, Arlington, Norfolk, Alexandria and Richmond City is what killed him.

Something similar seems to be playing out in this year’s state election contests there. The anti-red wave is showing its face and despite a Kamala-like candidate, Democratic schlemiel Abigail Spanberger, with nothing whatsoever to offer, is going to sit back and watch the Republicans lose. There have been some complaints that she’s taking minority voters for granted and just putting all her energy into white suburban swing voters. 

The new Decision Desk polling average indicates a classic lesser of two evils election. Voters want to reject Trump’s party but there is very little enthusiasm for Spanberger, who has nevertheless been ahead in every single poll this year, never getting to 50%. The new average has her ahead of Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears with 45.2% to 36%. Spanberger is the embodiment of the centrist, corporate-friendly Democrat whose entire political brand is built on not rocking the boat. She offers no bold vision, no transformative policies and no real reason for voters—especially younger and working-class ones— to get excited. Her campaign seems laser-focused on courting the affluent white suburbs. She rarely sticks her neck out on tough issues, preferring carefully triangulated talking points over moral clarity. In a moment that demands courage, she delivers caution. Spanberger isn’t leading a movement; she’s riding a wave she didn’t help build and doesn’t seem to understand. If she wins, it won’t be because voters believe in her— it’ll be because they fear something worse. But let’s not lose track of the fact that in Congress, she carved out a reputation as a Blue Dog more interested in appealing to corporate donors and GOP-lite centrism than in advancing any kind of progressive agenda. She consistently undermined the left flank of her party, opposed popular initiatives like Medicare for All, and was quick to scold fellow Democrats for being too bold, all while offering little in the way of substantive accomplishments herself.

That said, it should come as no surprise that Spanberger is outraising her opponent gigantically. She’s brought in $27 million so far (with $15 on hand), while Earl-Sears only raised $11 million in total with just $4 million cash-on-hand. But it gets worse for the GOP. Aside from tanking the gubernatorial candidate, Trump’s albatross role is also killing the down-ballot candidates.

Howie: Grok, how homophobic is the Virginia GOP? Grok: The Virginia GOP's homophobia is evident in the establishment's push to force John Reid, their openly gay lieutenant governor nominee, to withdraw from the race over disputed social media content, a move many see as targeting his sexuality rather than substantive issues.

Gay talk radio host John Reid (AKA “JRdeux”), whose campaign in enmeshed in a series of sex scandals, is fighting with his own party establishment which has been trying to get him to drop out, and is losing to Democratic state Senator Ghazala Hashmi 46-36%. Former Democratic Delegate Jay Jones is on track to oust far right Attorney General Jason Miyares, who he’s leading 47-38%

Despite the state Democratic Party itself, every single seat is being contested by a Democratic candidate— even the most deeply red seats in Buchanan, Dickenson, Lee, Russell, Scott, Tazwell and Wise counties. Even with a huge anti-red wave, those aren’t districts that are about to flip blue, but if there are candidates campaigning, turnout with be better for Democrats and that’s going to help drive up numbers for Spanberger, Hashmi and Jones… and remind voters that there is a Democratic Party.

The Virginia party doesn’t seem to get that but Fergie Reid’s 90 For 90 worked to make sure every district had a candidate— even while the GOP is running just 84 out of 100, immediately giving ip 16% of the districts. Today, Reid asked us to “look at the recent special election results around the country; there’s an obvious backlash to the second Trump presidency. Virginia has the first chance to send a strong message to the country and the world that, ‘We’re still here, and we’re not with Trump!’ The recent special election results are Dem over-performances, almost without exception. If Virginia Dems over-perform at the 5% level, they’ll pick up every one of the GOP held House districts that Harris won, giving them a 60 seat majority. If they over-perform at the 15% to 20% level, as we’ve seen in some special elections, they’ll have a 70 seat majority, a super-majority. Nobody wants to come out and say that openly. I’m saying it. We need to play hard to make this a reality. A result like that doesn’t happen by random chance; but, there aren’t a lot of other elections going on this year. All of the Dems in the country could be getting involved now, if they wanted to. So, let’s go. Let’s do this. Let’s send this message.”

Right now only 2 of the 51 Democratic seats are considered even remotely vulnerable. Of the 49 Republican seats, as many as 14 are ripe for flipping, far more than the state party is comfortable seriously going after. Fortunately, there are 14 candidates who are very serious about flipping those seats. And three of those candidates are progressives endorsed by Blue America: Elizabeth Guzman, Jessica Anderson and Lily Franklin. The irony is thick: Spanberger on the verge of stumbling into the governor’s mansion on the back of a movement she’s never lifted a finger to build— while true grassroots candidates, running in much tougher terrain with far fewer resources, are the ones doing the real work of turning Virginia blue. If there’s a lesson here, it’s that change doesn’t come from the top down. It comes from the bottom up, from organizers like Fergie Reid and candidates like Elizabeth Guzman who don’t wait for permission from party insiders, who don’t triangulate, who don’t hedge. Virginia's political future shouldn't be left in the hands of milquetoast centrists like Spanberger— it should belong to the fighters on the ground, like Guzman, Anderson and Franklin. Again, please let’s help them finish the job.