The political fallout from the government shutdown has crossed the Potomac River, injecting fresh tension into Virginia’s gubernatorial race.
Democrat Abigail Spanberger and Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears are each aligning closely with her party’s stance as the finger-pointing and public relations battle over who is to blame intensifies.
Ms. Earle-Sears has criticized Virginia’s Democratic senators, Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, accusing them — and by extension “their sidekick” Ms. Spanberger — of obstructing Republican efforts to avert the shutdown through a proposed seven-week stopgap funding measure.
Meanwhile, Ms. Spanberger argues that the government shutdown is yet another example of President Trump and Republican leadership hurting Virginians and that the administration is going too far with its threats of mass firings.
“This is so far beyond what we’ve seen in previous government shutdowns or in previous threats of shutdowns,” she said. “I think when you have an OMB director saying that they’re going to start mass layoffs, that doesn’t signify in any way a good-faith effort to work to end this shutdown.”
Mr. Trump said Thursday that he is meeting with Russ Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, to suss out “which of the many Democrat agencies, most of which are a political scam, he recommends to be cut.”
In a separate fundraising email, Ms. Spanberger warned supporters that, “Donald Trump shut down the government in order to jumpstart DOGE 2.0.”
For her part, Ms. Earle-Sears said Democrats have chosen “politics over people” in the stalled spending negotiations, leaving “families wondering how they’ll pay the bills.”
“At a time when Virginians need leadership, they chose to play games,” she said.
Democrats in Washington are pressing Mr. Trump and congressional Republicans to extend the enhanced Obamacare subsidies enacted during the COVID-19 pandemic and to undo future Medicaid spending cuts embedded in the president’s signature “Big Beautiful Bill.”
Republicans, meanwhile, are urging Democratic lawmakers to break with their leadership to help garner the 60 votes needed to pass a stopgap funding measure that would allow more time for negotiations and avert a prolonged government shutdown.
According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, making the Obamacare subsidies permanent would cost an estimated $350 billion over the next decade.
Washington politics have long cast a shadow over Virginia’s off-year elections, where the party of the sitting president typically faces strong headwinds in the year after its national victory.
This year, Ms. Spanberger — a former CIA officer and member of Congress — is capitalizing on that dynamic.
The latest Emerson College Polling/The Hill tracking survey shows Ms. Spanberger holding a 52% to 42% lead over Ms. Earle-Sears and she also has a double-digit lead among early voters, who began casting ballots on Sept. 19.
The voters surveyed identified the economy as their top concern, followed by threats to democracy, education, health care, and housing. Ms. Spanberger has focused her campaign on affordability, pledging to lower costs for health care, housing, and energy.
Ms. Earle-Sears, meanwhile, has sought to shift the debate toward cultural issues, challenging Ms. Spanberger on transgender issues, specifically the participation of biological men in women’s sports and access to bathrooms based on gender identity.
The Republican started running a new ad this week in which a mother, identified as “Abbie,” talks about how her son shared restroom urinals with girls, and her daughter competing against men in track.
“Spanberger wrote a law to make this stuff legal,” the mother says directly to the camera, alluding to the vote the Democrat cast in Congress. “That’s not just disgusting, it’s disqualifying.”
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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