Polls have closed in Virginia where voters were deciding a history-making race for governor Tuesday that will serve as a barometer of attitudes toward President Donald Trump and Democrats’ attempts to regain their footing on the national stage.
Republican Winsome Earle-Sears, a staunch conservative who serves as Virginia’s lieutenant governor, and Democrat Abigail Spanberger, a center-left Democrat and former CIA case officer who helped her party win a House majority during Trump’s first presidency, were vying to become the first-ever woman to lead the commonwealth. Earle-Sears also would make history as the first Black woman elected governor in any state.
The race to replace term-limited Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin took on national dimensions from the start, serving as a testing ground for both parties one year ahead of national midterm elections that could redirect the country’s course for the balance of Trump’s second term. Virginia, a state Trump lost in three successive presidential contests, has been strained by many of his policies, particularly the steep cuts to the civil service and the ongoing government shutdown.
