Democrat Abigail Spanberger has been elected Virginia’s first female governor as her party racked up victories in key elections across the southern state.
An ex-CIA and federal law enforcement officer who served three terms in the US House of Representatives after flipping a GOP-held district, Spanberger was leading the state’s Republican lieutenant governor Winsome Earle-Sears 55% to 45%, with 72% of the vote counted, according to the Associated Press.
“Tonight, we sent a message. We sent a message to every corner of the commonwealth, a message to our neighbors and our fellow Americans across the country,” Spanberger told supporters gathered at a convention center in the state capital, Richmond.
“We sent a message to the whole world that in 2025, Virginia chose pragmatism over partisanship. We chose our commonwealth over chaos.”
Virginia has grown steadily more Democratic in recent elections, and Spanberger had led Earle-Sears in the polls for most of the race. She will replace Republican governor Glenn Youngkin, who was ineligible for re-election after serving the single consecutive four-year term the state’s constitution allows.
It was the crowning achievement of what the results so far indicated was an excellent night for Democrats across the commonwealth.
The AP reported that Democratic state senator Ghazala Hashmi won the lieutenant governor’s race, becoming the first Muslim woman elected to a statewide office in the United States. And state Democrats appear on course to greatly expand their one-seat majority in the house of delegates and win the attorney general’s race despite fielding a controversial candidate.
The victories set the stage for a Democratic governing trifecta that is set to redraw congressional maps in their favor – a potential boon to the party’s hopes of retaking the US House of Representatives next year.
And while ballot counting remains ongoing in races for the lower chamber of Virginia’s legislature, Democrats have thus far won 21 seats, and Republicans two.
Democratic former state delegate Jay Jones is ahead of the Republican incumbent, Jason Miyares, in the race for attorney general, with 77% of ballots counted, according to the AP. That race was shaken up dramatically when a text message from Jones to another state lawmaker emerged showing the Democrat musing about a political rival receiving “two bullets to the head”.
While her election may be viewed as a sign that Democrats are regaining momentum following the disappointment of the 2024 election, Spanberger did not attend any of the “No Kings” protests against Donald Trump, and largely avoid discussing the president by name while campaigning. She instead emphasized her record while in Congress of being the most bipartisan member from Virginia, and focused on how Democrats would address issues such as guaranteeing healthcare and lowering the cost of living.
But in her victory speech, she nodded to Trump’s offensive against the federal workers who make up an important constituency, particularly in northern Virginia’s Democratic strongholds.
“To those across the Potomac who are attacking our jobs and our economy, I will not stand by silently while you attack Virginia’s workers,” she said.
“I will fight every single day for every single Virginia jobs – the ones we have now, and the ones we will bring to our commonwealth into the future. I will stand up to anyone who tries to harm our economy or the livelihoods of our Virginians.”
Trump had endorsed Earle-Sears, the first woman of color elected to statewide office in Virginia. The lieutenant governor centered her campaign on the sorts of culture war issues that boosted the president’s candidacy in last year’s presidential election, and helped Youngkin take the governor’s mansion in 2021, less than a year into Joe Biden’s presidency.
Ultimately, it was not enough to replicate Youngkin’s success, nor overcome what has been dubbed “the Virginia curse”, where the party out of the White House has won the governor’s mansion – with a single exception – in every election since 1976.
