Republican Glenn Youngkin is surging in the Virginia governor’s race as President Joe Biden’s job approval ratings tumble, forecasting a brutal 2022 for Democrats across the country absent a major political turnaround.
Youngkin, a private equity investor, and former Gov. Terry McAuliffe, the Democratic nominee, are neck and neck in Virginia in recent polling six weeks before Election Day. Youngkin actually led by 5 percentage points in one mid-September survey, and Republican insiders privy to private polling said the data was not far off from what they are seeing in other internal assessments. Simultaneously, Biden’s job approval ratings are now underwater, especially among crucial independent voters.
To be sure, there are several factors influencing the Youngkin-McAuliffe campaign. But Republicans say their ace in the hole is Biden’s newly precarious standing, and that is what should concern Democrats elsewhere. A Republican victory in Virginia, a Democratic-leaning state where Biden defeated former President Donald Trump by more than 10 points just one year ago, would be a political earthquake, setting the tone for major GOP gains in next year’s midterm elections.
“Simply put: Yes, Biden is a drag,” said Republican pollster Chris Wilson, who is advising Youngkin. “The enthusiasm behind his campaign is something Virginia hasn’t seen in years.”
Democrats are moving to overcome Biden’s slippage by tying Youngkin to Trump.
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This pattern is likely to repeat itself on a grand scale in 2022, with Democrats charging in campaigns for governor, House, and Senate, that their Republican opponents are no different than the former president. “Youngkin should stop trying to distort McAuliffe’s record and actually answer questions about his total allegiance to Trump,” the Democratic Governors Association said Friday in a press release.
Meanwhile, while Democrats concede they face a difficult environment in the midterm elections, they remain confident in McAuliffe to hold off Youngkin and are optimistic that Biden will do his part to right the ship ahead of next year. Some Democrats note that Biden was periodically under political pressure in his 2020 presidential campaign, only to recover from whatever missteps or challenges he was facing.
“Terry McAuliffe has been super on message from Day One,” said a Democratic operative who has advised Virginia campaigns. “Joe Biden is super on message with jobs and the pandemic.”
Virginia law does not permit incumbent governors to run for reelection, although, like McAuliffe is attempting to do, former chief executives are permitted to serve nonconsecutive terms. And that comeback attempt by the former governor is among the dynamics that could be boosting Republican fortunes, in that Youngkin, 54, is the “fresh face” in the contest, versus McAuliffe, 64, a veteran national political figure who is the retread. Republicans following the campaign certainly think so.
But in a state that has not seen a Republican elected to the Senate since 2002; that has not seen a Republican win a presidential contest since 2004; and that has not seen a Republican win the governor’s race since 2009, there appears to be much more at play in this key off-year campaign than parochial issues and a battle of personalities. Rather, Republican insiders believe the race has been nationalized.
There is plenty more campaign left to go, and McAuliffe still has to be considered the favorite.
But Republicans say they are positioned for success with suburban voters who abandoned the GOP because of Trump. Played out across the country in 2022, Republicans would recover ground lost in 2018, when they lost the House in a 40-seat suburban swing, and along with it, the speaker’s gavel. Under these conditions, gaining the one net seat in the Senate the GOP needs to recapture the majority there also is within reach.
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“What is most notable so far is that Youngkin and [Republican attorney general nominee Jason] Miyares are doing well in the downstate suburbs and in the exurbs on the far edges of the D.C. market,” said Brad Todd, a Republican strategist based in Northern Virginia. “The affluent inner suburbs are still a hard nut to crack, but thus far they are winning back nearly enough [Mitt Romney/George W. Bush] suburbanites to get across the line.”
However, some Republicans are hesitating to draw too many conclusions about the midterm elections from Virginia, in part because of Trump. They worry the former president’s obsession with the 2020 election and ability to dominate the political landscape could energize liberal voters who might otherwise sit the race out and help Democrats compensate for vulnerabilities caused by Biden.
