The night before his inauguration, Glenn Youngkin picked up right where he never really left off…exaggerating, outright lying, and pledging to win a Republican “trifecta” next year. As Brandon Jarvis of Virginia Scope reported last night, Youngkin “address[ed] hundreds of supporters on the eve of his inauguration,” during which he said the following:
- “We had droves of Democrats come over, we won the Latino vote, we won the Asian vote, we had more Black Virginians vote for us than any Republican in living memory. We won Hampton Roads, we won Greater Richmond…”
- “I can’t tell you how honored I am to be going to work tomorrow with a majority in our House of Delegates. And I have to say, 2023 is right around the corner, so get ready for the Senate.”
On the first bullet point, see below for a quick fact check by yours truly and by Sam Shirazi. In fact, as it turns out – and Youngkin presumably knows this – CNN’s exit polling showed that, in fact:
- Terry McAuliffe won Hampton Roads 54%-46%. And according to Sam Shirazi’s calculations, McAuliffe won Hampton Roads by a 259,522-222,026 margin. So Youngkin’s claim here is most certainly not accurate – and presumably he knows that.
- Terry McAuliffe won the Latino/Hispanic AND Asian-American votes by more than 2:1 margins (66%-32% and 67%-33%)
- As for the African-American vote, McAuliffe won it by an 86%-13% margin, almost identical to the 87%-12% margin by which Ralph Northam won the African-American vote in 2017.
Finally, on Youngkin’s point about taking back the State Senate next year, hopefully Senate Democrats don’t fool themselves that Youngkin wants to work together, because clearly his plan is to take the Senate majority next year, then ram through his right-wing agenda. Period, end of story. Which means that Senate Democrats need to act accordingly, as President Pro Tem Louise Lucas clearly understands…
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