Barack Obama headlined a rally Saturday in Virginia to try to secure a victory for the state’s Democratic gubernatorial candidate, who leads in polls days before the election.
Obama moved between criticizing Donald Trump and Republican policy and rhetoric – with a bit of humor – while also explaining how Abigail Spanberger could help counter what Democrats see as the country’s downward trajectory.
“As for the president, he has been focused on critical issues like paving over the Rose Garden so folks don’t get mud on their shoes, and gold-plating the Oval Office and building a $300m ballroom,” Obama said. “So Virginia, here’s the good news. If you can’t visit a doctor, don’t worry, he will save you a dance.”
The former US president stopped in the afternoon in Norfolk, Virginia, to stump for the former representative who at 55% support among voters leads the Republican lieutenant governor, Winsome Earle-Sears, by 14 points, according to a YouGov survey conducted from 17 to 28 October.
Obama later spoke in Newark, New Jersey, on behalf of the US representative Mikie Sherrill, whom 51% of voters favor, as compared with Jack Ciattarelli, a Republican state assembly member, who has 42% support, according to the same report.
Obama spoke after Sherrill, continuing his criticism of Trump and his policies. “We’ve got a president who deployed the national guard in American cities and claimed to be stopping crime waves that don’t actually exist,” Obama said. “We’ve got masked ICE agents in unmarked vans pulling people in off the streets, including US citizens, on the suspicion that they don’t look like real Americans.
“It’s like every day is Halloween except it’s all tricks and no treats,” Obama said amid reports of immigration raids taking place in Chicago and Los Angeles even on Halloween night.
He highlighted Sherrill’s experience as a navy helicopter pilot, federal prosecutor and mother of four, saying it made her “the kind of leader who understands the mission”. “She knows who she’s supposed to serve,” Obama said.
Earlier Saturday, Obama called New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani and offered to be a “sounding board” if the 34-year-old Democratic frontrunner wins the election. He also praised Mamdani’s campaign, a spokesperson confirmed to Reuters.
“Zohran Mamdani appreciated President Obama’s words of support and their conversation on the importance of bringing a new kind of politics to our city,” said Mamdani spokesperson Dora Pekec.
Mamdani, a Uganda-born state assembly member, has polled well ahead of his main rival, former New York governor Andrew Cuomo, before the 4 November general election.
The 4 November elections, in states that have flipped back and forth between Republican and Democratic governors, are seen as indicators of how the country feels about Trump and the two parties in the off-year race.
“There is absolutely no evidence Republicans’ policies have made life better for you, the people of Virginia,” Obama said at the rally. “They have devoted enormous energy trying to entrench themselves in power and punishing their enemies and enriching their friends and silencing their critics.”
“It’s time to point America in a better direction by electing Abigail Spanberger as your next governor,” Obama added.
Virginia voters will be electing a female governor for the first time. Spanberger is a former CIA analyst who served three terms in Congress; Earle-Sears became lieutenant governor in 2022, making her the first woman of color to hold a statewide office in Virginia.
In an October debate, Earle-Sears, a US Marine Corps veteran, focused on culture-war issues like transgender women in sports.
“Are you going to change in a gym where men are nude in the locker rooms?” Earle-Sears asked Spanberger. “Are you going to do that, Abigail? I don’t think you will. What about your girl children?”
Spanberger responded that there should never be nude men in women’s locker rooms and that decisions on transgender athletes competing in girls’ sports “should be made between parents and educators and teachers in each community. It should not be dictated by politicians.”
At the rally Saturday, Spanberger said her opponent was “focused on the wrong things”.
“We need a governor who will recognize that Virginians are struggling to afford the rising costs in healthcare, housing and energy,” said Spanberger, who was the first Democrat to win her district in almost 50 years.
The former president touted Spanberger’s rank as one of the most bipartisan members of the House.
“Abigail has real, practical plans to grow the economy and strengthen Virginia schools and lower the cost of everything from housing to healthcare to energy, and she is willing to reach across the aisle to make it happen,” Obama said.
He referenced the thousands of federal workers who have lost their jobs because of the Trump administration’s efforts to cut federal spending. An estimated 750,000 workers have also been furloughed amid the government shutdown.
Virginia, right next to Washington DC, has a large federal workforce and has been especially hurt by those job cuts.
One rally attendee, Tanya Keller, a 60-year-old Norfolk resident, said she supports Spanberger because she thinks Spanberger is rational and concerned about people losing federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and Medicaid coverage.
Obama “reminded us what is at stake, what is important and how we have to fight being divided”, said Keller, who has volunteered for Spanberger’s campaign.
Meanwhile, in New Jersey, the race has centered on Trump’s policies. Sherrill, a former navy helicopter pilot and federal prosecutor, focused in a debate last month on the impact of tariffs on grocery prices and of the “big, beautiful bill” on healthcare and utility costs. She said that Ciattarelli refused to stand up to Trump.
“He’ll do whatever Trump tells him to do,” she said. “All he says is: ‘Trump’s right.’”
