Examining Virginia's Dysfunctional Republican Ticket

Though it’s far too early to predict, polling already shows Abigail Spanberger up 17 percentage points on Winsome Earle-Sears in the race to become Virginia’s next governor. This isn’t entirely surprising given the current political climate—Glenn Youngkin, after all, was elected governor in a push against big Democratic wins in 2020, and Ralph Northam won big in 2017 in the Blue Wave response to Trump’s first election. Since the MAGA era has begun, Virginia’s elections tend to be early predictors of how midterm elections will turn out, as well as an indicator of how popular or unpopular the current national administration is—Youngkin won over previous governor Terry McAuliffe by about 2%, predicting a less impactful “red wave” in the midterm elections, in contrast to 2017, when Northam defeated Ed Gillespie by about 9%, indicating a much larger unrest about the new presidential administration. But this year, it’s not just the numbers that tell the story—it’s the cracks within the Virginia Republican Party itself that may prove even more revealing.


Though the Democratic ticket faced a crowded, competitive field for lieutenant governor, as well as a competitive race between the two attorney general candidates, this year’s gubernatorial election has all been very standard on the Democratic side. The party seems eager to put up a united front to appeal to those, Democratic and otherwise, disillusioned by Trump’s policies, from tariffs to immigration. Such normality is the case with the Republican ticket, at first blush, but upon closer inspection, there are evident cracks in the ticket that may speak to a larger chasm in Virginia’s Republican politics.


For one, and perhaps most importantly, the ticket is far from united. John Reid’s unopposed candidacy for lieutenant governor has been the primary catalyst for concern about the unity of the party—Reid has been entangled in a controversy involving a Tumblr account linked to him featuring photos of nude male models. Reid has denied that the account was his, described the attacks against him as “extortion,” and denounced the individuals in the party as “solely motivated to stage a coup against a gay man who they didn’t want to be their nominee and didn’t have the guts to run against.” This was not the first “scandal” to target Reid as a gay man in his candidacy for lieutenant governor: in early April, “two local religious activists” had threatened to release what Reid called “photos that would destroy my life” and admonished Reid that “[he] would never work in all of America again and it was in [his] best interest to drop out of the race for lieutenant governor.” The photos? Pictures of Reid at a drag show. What truly demonstrates the fragility of the Virginia Republican Party is these two, in the grand scheme of things, minor scandals constituting enough cause for concern for Reid to receive a personal call from Governor Youngkin telling him to withdraw from the race.


Reid, in his statement on the controversy, said, “[The rumor is] predictable, but what I didn’t expect was the governor I have always supported to call and demand my resignation without even showing me the supposed evidence or offering me a chance to respond. I did not accept that and I deeply resent it.” His response demonstrated the cracks forming within the state’s party between its current face, Youngkin, who is rumored to be looking towards a national bid in the near future, and its potential future second-in-command. And the saga only continues to unfold: a newly surfaced recording of a conversation between Matt Moran, the top political strategist for Governor Youngkin, and John Reid’s campaign staff demonstrates the legitimate extortion the candidate faced in his decision to stay in the race. “If he stays in the race, [the releasing of damaging opposition research] is going to continue,” Moran says in the recording. “That hurts our candidates up and down the ticket. [Reid] getting out of the race is the only way it stops.”


Youngkin, though leaving office, demonstrates the fundamental cracks in the party’s unity through this immensely publicized feud with Reid. Youngkin has yet to throw his support behind Reid, commenting publicly on the scandal and his phone call to the candidate: “The decision is John's, it's up to John. But that’s what I wanted him to understand, is that at a time when we need to be speaking about really important topics, it’s a distraction.” Upon Reid winning his unopposed primary, Youngkin simply tweeted, “Congratulations to the winners of tonight’s primaries and all of our candidates!” with no reference to the names of any of those candidates in question.


Earle-Sears herself has never shied away from making her thoughts on LGBTQ+ rights known—recent criticism was drawn to her personal note on a bill protecting marriage licenses for same-sex couples, saying she was “morally opposed” to the contents of the bill. The author of the bill, notably the Virginia General Assembly’s first openly gay Black member, said, “[Earle-Sears] knows I’m an openly gay Black state representative, so the fact that she wrote something personal on my bill, knowing that she knows me and my family, that was somewhat disheartening.” The bill was passed in 2024; it would be difficult to believe that her thoughts on the LGBTQ+ community have changed since. This puts Earle-Sears in a difficult position given her running mate John Reid’s status as an openly gay man and raises a number of questions: will the two campaign together to project unity despite Earle-Sears’ “moral opposition” to John Reid’s existence as a gay man, and if so, how much? How intertwined will these two campaigns be, in comparison to the united front of the Virginia Democratic ticket? 


The answer? Rarely, and not very. Though the candidates have appeared together once, their campaigns are walking the thin line of addressing the numerous elephants in the room. “Republicans have been looking for a signal that we’re all three on the same page, and I tell people unity doesn’t mean that everybody agrees on everything, because we don’t,” said Reid on the matter, a shaky attempt at demonstrating a strong front ready to defeat the goliath ticket of Virginia Democrats who are going across the state on a unified bus tour. UVA Professor Larry Sabato addressed the impossibility of Earle-Seares and Attorney General incumbent and candidate Jason Miyares ignoring one-third of their ticket. “The big question is, how often is this going to happen? How often will they be together? How will they speak about one another except in generalities?” Sabato said. These questions can only be answered as the campaign goes on, but the Virginia Republican Party will surely have to work a lot harder to dispute the image they currently present: a disoriented, disjointed ticket caught between the party’s past and its future. If Virginia elections are bellwethers, then this year’s race may offer more than a preview of the 2026 midterm elections; it may expose the fault lines within the Republican Party, not just in the commonwealth, but nationwide.

DomesticAnna ScottComment