McAuliffe's Ability To Defeat Youngkin Questioned By Candidates

VIRGINIA — Democrats running for governor in Virginia are attacking fellow candidate Terry McAuliffe, the front-runner for the Democratic nomination, by pointing to his slim victory over Republican candidate Ken Cuccinelli in the 2013 gubernatorial election.

McAuliffe’s campaign released a new advertisement Wednesday morning where the former governor says he has beaten “extreme Republicans before,” referring to Cuccinelli, “and I’ll do it again. But I need you with me.”

McAuliffe won the 2013 election with 47.8 percent of the vote compared to 45.2 percent for Cuccinelli, who had served as state attorney general and then served in the Trump administration as director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. The Libertarian Party candidate in the 2013 election won almost 7 percent of the vote.

State Del. Lee Carter (D-50), who is seeking the Democratic nomination, said in a tweet Monday that McAuliffe’s narrow 2013 win “was with record low turnout, against Cuccinelli who had half as much money and a long record of extremist positions.”

“Glenn Youngkin will have all the money in the world, and has no record to attack,” Carter said, referring to the Republican nominee for governor. “We can't risk this w/ a weak candidate like T-Mac.”

Youngkin, who has never held political office, reportedly has an estimated personal worth of $254 million. The former Carlyle Group CEO won the Republican nomination for governor at Saturday’s “unassembled” convention.

The Democrats are holding a primary election on June 8 where they will select their nominees for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general. Early voting has already started in the Democratic primary. McAuliffe, who served his first term from 2014 to 2018, is seeking a second term as governor; Virginia does not allow governors to serve consecutive terms.

The campaign of former Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy, who is also seeking the Democratic nomination for governor, echoed Carter’s stance on a McAuliffe nomination.

“Terry McAuliffe claims that he’s the strongest general election candidate, but that couldn’t be further from the truth,” Kaylie Hanson Long, Carroll Foy’s deputy campaign manager, said Wednesday in a news release.

McAuliffe “eked out a win” against Cuccinelli “in a low-turnout election by just 2.5 percent despite outspending him by nearly two-to-one, something he’s unlikely to be able to do against Glenn Youngkin’s well-funded campaign,” Hanson Long said.

“We must elect a Democrat in November — but we put that goal at risk by nominating Terry McAuliffe in June. The reality is that Democrats won’t be able to win in November by nominating one plutocrat to take on another plutocrat,” she said.

While current Gov. Ralph Northam embraced more progressive policies after his college yearbook scandal and Democrats now have a majority in the General Assembly, Virginia has shied away from electing progressive candidates to statewide office.

Northern Virginia, a Democratic stronghold, went strongly for President Joe Biden in the Democratic presidential primary in March 2020; Biden defeated Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) 53 percent to 23 percent in the Virginia primary.

While there is voter support for progressive policies like Medicare for All and increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour in Virginia, big elections in the state have seen progressive losses to more centrist or conservative candidates, Cameron Jones reported in an article for the Capital News Service.

Nearly half of Democratic voters back McAuliffe at 47 percent, with no other candidates breaking double digits, according to a Wason Center poll from April. More than a quarter of surveyed voters were undecided.

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