Democrat Tom Perriello Thursday joined the 2017 race for governor in Virginia, promising to make sure the commonwealth acts as a firewall to Republican President-elect Trump.
Perriello, a former congressman with ties to President Obama, is challenging Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam in the June 13 Democratic primary. Perriello is considered more progressive than the centrist Northam, who once flirted with becoming a Republican, and his campaign could upset Democrats’ plans to build a unified front to contrast against what could be a nasty GOP primary.
“I’m running for Governor. VA will remain the firewall vs Trump — our values worth defending,” Perriello said in a Twitter post.
Virginia is a purple state that, in gubernatorial elections, often votes for the nominee who represents the party not in power in the White House. That would seem to give Democrats the edge heading into November. But that’s not how it worked four years ago. A year after Obama won re-election in 2012, Virginians elected Democrat Terry McAuliffe governor over Republican Ken Cuccinelli.
Virginia governors are limited to one four-year term.
With Perriello challenging Northam for the Democratic nod, a proxy-war for leadership of that party in the post-Obama era could be playing out.
Northam is aligned with McAuliffe, a longtime ally of President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, the Democrats’ 2016 presidential nominee. She won Virginia in that election but was defeated by Trump; she and her husband’s role in the party going forward is in question. Obama, meanwhile, appears to quietly be laying the groundwork for continued influence.
A similar proxy war is playing out at the national level. Labor Secretary Tom Perez, who serves under Obama and is close with him and key players in the president’s political orbit, is running for chairman of the Democratic National Committee against Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., who has been endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
Ed Gillespie is the front-runner for the Republican nomination in Virginia. The veteran Republican political operative and lobbyist came close to unseating Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., in 2014, surprising prognosticators and party insiders who didn’t think he had a chance. He faces three opponents in the June primary.
That contest will be the first major election after Trump takes office in Washington and could offer clues as to how voters feel about his leadership. The Republican primary could also reveal how deep Trump’s influence runs in his party.
Gillespie’s opponents include a conservative county board of supervisors chairman positioning himself as Trump’s man in Virginia, a business owner, and a state senator who is running on his business experience.
