Voting in Virginia is seen as an assessment of Biden’s performance as president and as a litmus test for the 2022 Congressional election.
The Democratic Party of the United States risks losing control of Congress in elections in 2022. This is evidenced by the results of the first regional elections under the presidency of Democrat Joe Biden: in the gubernatorial elections in the state of Virginia, which is traditionally considered the fiefdom of the Democratic Party, the Republicans won a major victory.
On the eve, sociologists calculated that the fall in Biden’s rating in nine months in the White House was the largest among the elected US presidents after World War II. The actions of the current US president are disapproved by 54 percent of respondents. Correspondent.net tells the details.
Defeat of Democrats came as a surprise
This week, the US states of Virginia, New Jersey and New York held their first regional elections during the presidency of Joe Biden.
The Democratic Party traditionally occupies a very strong position there, and most experts expected that, despite the fall in the presidential ratings, the Democrats would be able to retain the lead.
The predictions came true only in traditionally democratic New York, where Democrat Eric Adams confidently won the fight for the post of mayor.
But the elections in New Jersey have become unexpectedly difficult for Democrats. In this state, experts predicted a comfortable victory over Republican Jack Chatarelli for Democratic Governor Phil Murphy.
But at the time of counting 88 percent of the vote, the difference between politicians was 0.1 percent in favor of the Republican candidate.
Although the results in New Jersey came as a real surprise to the Americans, experts pay much more attention to Virginia, where victory was strategically important for both parties.
The former governor of the state, Terry McAuliffe, fought for the governor’s post from the Democrats, from the Republicans – Glenn Yangkin, who calls himself a businessman and political outsider.
Official data have not yet been announced, but according to preliminary data, 50.7 percent of voters voted for Yangkin, and 48.6 percent for the former governor.
The defeat of the Democrats came as a surprise – even a few weeks before the election, McAuliffe was confidently heading opinion polls, and the Republicans have not won here since 2009.
According to Politico, the Democratic Party has made multimillion-dollar investments in McAuliffe’s campaign. The Democrats also supported their candidate by deeds: Biden personally with his wife Jill and Vice President Kamala Harris took part in the rallies in his support.
The financier Yangkin was more modest. His election campaign took place mainly in the suburbs. He spoke about issues such as racism in schools and the coronavirus pandemic, in particular the wearing of masks.
In pre-election polls, Republicans have won the support of independent voters who have been pushed aside by Donald Trump’s campaign style in the 2020 presidential election.
The elections in Virginia are viewed by American political scientists as a litmus test showing the mood of voters after the first year of Biden’s rule.
Quite often, the electorate in conservative Virginia, which is nothing more than a suburb of the American capital Washington, changes its preferences, reflecting the context of the entire country.
This view is supported by Fox News columnist and head of the political consulting firm President of Cavalry LLC Josh Holmes. He recalls that it was the loss of the Republicans in Virginia in 2005 that actually canceled the landslide victory of George W. Bush in the presidential election a year earlier.
“The victory (of Democrat Tim Kane in the struggle for the governor’s seat from Virginia – ed.) Was a wake-up call for the Republican Party, mired in public incitement to war in Iraq,” Holmes said.
State voters also expressed dissatisfaction with the federal government’s response to the aftermath of the devastating hurricane Katrina, he recalled.
Yangkin’s victory demonstrates that conservative politics are popular with moderate and undecided voters who are unhappy with mandatory vaccinations and rethinking American history in an anti-racist spirit.
THANK YOU, VIRGINIA!
It’s a new day in the Commonwealth, and I am profoundly humbled by the trust placed on me.
We are going to get to work on Day One to ensure that Virginians soar and never settle. pic.twitter.com/hGN89mZ8kr
— Glenn Youngkin (@GlennYoungkin) November 3, 2021
Americans are unhappy with the rise in crime and a number of economic problems – inflation, rising gasoline prices due to the global fuel crisis and shortages of goods caused by logistics problems around the world.
Political analysts say the outcome of this race also means dissatisfaction with the lack of action of the Democrats in Washington. So, Biden promises record investments in infrastructure and education, but for several months he has not been able to get them through Congress, where representatives of different currents of his own party are constantly demanding changes and amendments to the project.
Yangkin’s victory would mean that many of the strategies that Democrats hoped to use in next year’s midterm elections are not working, and that the backlash against the Biden administration is far greater than Democrats feared, columnists for the Wall Street Journal argued.
But cultural controversies that divide many Americans also played an important role in this campaign in Virginia.
One of the main problems is women’s right to abortion. This fall, the state of Texas enacted a law prohibiting termination of pregnancy after the sixth week, with no exceptions for incest and rape.
The Biden administration is trying to challenge the law and calls it unconstitutional, but politicians in several conservative states want to impose similar bans.
Another bitter controversy concerns the teaching of “critical racial theory” in educational institutions. Its supporters believe that race is not a biologically predetermined category, but a set of criteria created by society, which is mainly used to infringe on the interests of representatives of the non-white population.
This theory goes much further in criticism of American history than liberal and even more conservative approaches, and describes the United States as a fundamentally racist society.
McAuliffe promised not to allow a ban on abortion and uncompromisingly stated that parents should not interfere in the educational process, which caused discontent among some voters. Yangkin, on the other hand, did not take a radical position on any of the problematic issues, which allowed him to look more advantageous.
This fact, notes the Axios edition, shows how important the debate over schools will play in the future struggle between Republicans and Democrats.
The WSJ writes that the Virginia precedent is important for the 2022 Congressional elections. Republicans will try to reclaim their majority in the House and Senate, where the current Democrats have a slight majority.
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