Biden ties Republican in race for governor to Trump
ARLINGTON, Va. — President Joe Biden framed the Virginia governor’s race as a repudiation of his predecessor, tying the Republican candidate to former President Donald Trump as he campaigned Tuesday night for Democrat Terry McAuliffe in what’s become a tight and increasingly bitter campaign.
No Republican has won statewide office in Virginia since 2009, and Biden carried it by a comfortable 10 percentage points in 2020. Yet polls have shown McAuliffe tied with Republican former business executive Glenn Youngkin with the election a week away — and the president’s own popularity is on the decline.
In the final days of the race, both candidates are focused on turning out their base supporters, with Republicans pressing culture war issues — prompting a debate over banning books in high school classrooms — and McAuliffe, who previously served as governor from 2014 to 2018, hammering Youngkin for his ties to Trump.
Biden drove that theme home during a rally in Arlington, just across the Potomac River from Washington, mentioning the former president by name more frequently than Youngkin and drawing a direct line from last year’s presidential race to next Tuesday’s election.
“I ran against Donald Trump and Terry is running against an acolyte of Donald Trump,”
Biden said.
He charged that Youngkin “not only embraces some of the essential lack of character, he endorses Donald Trump’s bad ideas and bad record.”
McAuliffe, meanwhile, told the same gathering that Youngkin “is ending his campaign the way he started it: With divisive dog whistles.”
“We have a choice: A path that promotes conspiracies, hate, division, or a path focused on lifting up every single Virginian,” McAuliffe said.
A loss by McAuliffe — or perhaps even a narrow victory — would be an ominous sign for Democrats already likely facing stiff political headwinds in next year’s midterm elections, when their narrow control of the House and Senate will be on the line. The party that wins the White House historically losses congressional seats in the next election, and Virginia, this cycle’s top off-year race, is seen as a key test of whether Democrats can head into 2022 with momentum.