Democrats are concerned for Terry McAuliffe’s campaign since polls show a neck-and-neck race with Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin in a state that has famously gone from “red” to “blue” in recent years.
McAuliffe served as governor from 2014-2018 after a narrow 47%-45% win over Ken Cuccinelli.
Virginia law doesn’t allow the state governor to serve two consecutive terms so Old Dominion voters elected Democrat Ralph Northam in 2018. He defeated GOP candidate Ed Gillespie more handily, 53%-45%.
A compilation of polls at RealClearPolitics shows McAuliffe leading Youngkin by less than one percent. Polls showed McAuliffe leading Cuccinelli by an average of three points in 2013.
Dr. Charles Dunn, who witnessed Virginia politics as a dean at Regent University, tells American Family News the desperation is obvious when a parade of big-name Democrats are making last-minute appearances.
“Obama is not popular. Biden is not popular. Kamala is not popular,” Dunn says. “[McAuliffe] is bringing in unpopular leaders to salvage his race. That puts him further in a desperate situation."
Biden, in fact, is scoring terrible approval numbers in national polls and McAuliffe acknowledged recently the president is not popular in the state.
McAuliffe dissed parents, dismissed 'equity' training
Before his first-ever win for public office, McAuliffe was better known as a savvy backroom operative who led the DNC and was as an ally of the Clinton political machine.
Washington Times columnist Robert Knight, a Virginia resident, has called McAuliffe a “bagman” for the Clintons whose backroom deals for them go back decades.
McAuliffe stepped on a political landmine during a debate with Youngkin when he stated, “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach.”
That statement likely ignited voters. Several of Virginia’s public school district have exploded with controversy after parents learned their children were being taught tenets of Critical Race Theory, which theorizes that white people are inherently racist and have set up society to oppress minorities and hold onto power.
McAuliffe was caught on tape calling that controversy a “right-wing conspiracy” during a June campaign stop and, more recently, he refused to even define Critical Race Theory in an otherwise low-key roundtable discussion with a local reporter.
“It's not taught in Virginia and it's never been taught in Virginia," McAuliffe, who called the issue a “dog whistle,” said of the Marxist-based theory that is, in fact, taught in some Virginia public schools as “equity” and “anti-racism” curriculum aimed at innocent white students.
"So how do you define it?" News 10 anchor Anita Blanton pressed the Democrat.
“Anita, it's not taught here in Virginia," McAuliffe repeated, even though school administrators at Loudoun County schools are designated as an “equity supervisor” and “equity director” overseeing district policies, classroom lessons, and teacher training.
The school district website states the goal to combat "systemic racism," a CRT-related term that means racism is inherent in education, law, society, and politics because of racist whites who are defined in CRT lessons as "oppressors" of minorities.
“But how do you define it?” she asked again.
“It doesn’t matter,” McAuliffe said.
Virginia’s voters will decide if it matters next week.
