CROSS JUNCTION, Va. — Four years ago, Virginia Democrats nominated a slow-talking, country-accented pediatrician named Ralph Northam who had been an anonymous lieutenant governor for Terry McAuliffe.

Unlike McAuliffe, he sounded and talked like a rural Virginian, so he seemed harmless. Northam ran a campaign that did not have any sharp edges, and therefore, the campaign was about the hottest thing going at the time — Donald Trump.