WaPo Strongly Endorses “Shrewd, Pragmatic and Tireless” Terry McAuliffe for Governor, Says Electing Glenn Youngkin Would Be a “Grave Error”

It’s not surprising that the Washington Post has endorsed Terry McAuliffe for governor, but it’s a very strong endorsement nonetheless – as well as a VERY strong rebuke of Glenn Youngkin. Here are a few highlights:

• “Democrat Terry McAuliffe makes a persuasive case as he campaigns to reclaim his former job as governor of Virginia, which does not allow consecutive terms in office. Having notched a string of successes in his first four-year term, which ended in 2018, Mr. McAuliffe — shrewd, pragmatic and tireless — has advanced an ambitious blueprint for a second term focused on education and equity.”
• “Glenn Youngkin, a candidate making his first run for political office, has played footsie with the scurrilously anti-democratic ‘big lie‘ that election fraud propelled President Biden into office; signaled he would roll back gun-safety laws and abortion access; equivocated on same-sex marriage; and called Medicaid expansion, which provided health insurance for hundreds of thousands of Virginians, ‘sad.'”
• “McAuliffe’s economic wins were matched by policy achievements, all the more impressive given that he faced a GOP-controlled legislature. He ended an ugly vestige of Jim Crow by restoring voting rights to tens of thousands of former felons who had served their sentences. He notched an important victory for women in a bipartisan deal that criminalized gun possession by the thousands of domestic abusers served with protective orders annually. He negotiated a massive, privately financed expansion in traffic-clogged Northern Virginia’s highway capacity, which will pay dividends to commuters and others for decades.”
• “McAuliffe has proposed a sweeping, detailed agenda — a sharp contrast with Mr. Youngkin, who for months had almost no policy proposals beyond a commission to tighten rules on nearly nonexistent election fraud.”
• “It’s critical that Virginians recall that Mr. McAuliffe is a dynamic chief executive with a proven track record for advancing prosperity. Mr. Youngkin is an untested politician who would guide the state away from the moderation it has pursued, and profited from, for more than a decade. Electing him would be a grave error.”