by Cindy
Whoever you supported in the Democratic primary for Governor, I have to say it was made really clear during the gubernatorial debate this week that there’s a huge difference between the candidates; and that realistically, a vote for Terry McAuliffe is a vote to keep progress moving forward in Virginia.
On women’s rights, Youngkin made it clear he would fight against access to safe abortions and leave women resorting to back alleys; McAuliffe promised to be a brick wall against any attempts to restrict access, reiterating “I say this again to every woman watching tonight: I will protect your rights.”
On the environment, McAuliffe said he wanted Virginia to get to 100% clean energy by 2035, and he understood that building clean energy investments creates productive green jobs, giving the example of the potential for Virginia to become the leading producer of wind turbines in Portsmouth, rather than importing them from abroad; Youngkin said that he would not have signed the Virginia Clean Economy Act, called it unworkable for the utility companies (who, by the way, were heavily involved in the negotiations over it), and said he wants to “leave all (energy) options open,” including coal and gas.
On jobs, McAuliffe said he strongly supports paid sick leave for all workers, and he has repeatedly said he supports getting us to $15/hr ASAP; Youngkin has repeatedly said he does not even support increasing the minimum wage.
On COVID, Youngkin refused to state any support for vaccine mandates anywhere—not for kids in school, not for employees, not even for nurses working with immune-compromised sick individuals at a hospital. McAuliffe supports those mandates, because until we get everyone vaccinated (even the 30% hardcore Trump supporters who think there’s a government tracking chip in the vaccine or something), we cannot move on from the pandemic, rebuild our economy, and regain our sense of normalcy.
They didn’t get to guns at the debate, but…I’m sure that the difference between them is pretty obvious there.
We’ve come so far in just two years of having a Democratic legislature and Governor Northam. We’ve made huge progress – not by swinging radically left of where most voters are, but by adopting commonsense reforms that broad majorities of voters supported. There’s still lots of room to improve and lots more to be done, and sometimes the progress we’ve made feels slow despite how transformative it is. That’s why it’s so critical we not let this progress halt, or even worse, be rolled back. Please get yourself out to vote, get your friends and relatives out to vote (especially if they’re Democrats!), dig deep for the next 45 days and bring this home!
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