Video: In Debate Last Night, VA11 Dem Nominee James Walkinshaw’s MAGA Opponent Spews Out Lies, Extremism: Here Are 10 of the Worst

[UPDATE 5:45 pm – The video is now public again…hopefully for good!]

[UPDATE 1:10 pm – Very weird; just noticed that the debate video, which had been PUBLIC, was made PRIVATE for some reason. I sure hope they make it public again…]

With early voting underway for the special election in VA11 (the actual election is on 9/9), last night there was a debate between the superbly qualified Democratic nominee James Walkinshaw and his MAGA-all-the-way Republican opponent, Stewart Whitson. As you watch the debate, keep in mind that Whitson is the guy who literally said “I trust everything [Trump]’s done” and “I cannot think of a single thing I disagree with with the president.” Crazy and disqualifying.  The good news is that VA11 is a deep-blue district, so Whitson has very little chance of getting elected. Having said that, Democrats DO need to show up and vote for James Walkinshaw…so make your plans to do so if you haven’t already!

With that, here are ten of the craziest, most extreme and/or false things Whitson said last night.

1. “My opponent has a history of soft-on-crime policies and other efforts that have actually made us less safe in our community. He’s a focus on sanctuary city policy, which has encouraged people to come into our district who shouldn’t be here, violent criminals who are bringing crime. He’s also defunded the police.” (This is all completely false, combined with xenophobic anti-immigrant fear mongering. Of course, James Walkinshaw did NOT “defund the police”. To the contrary, as you can see here, funding for the Fairfax police INCREASED by over $70 million between FY2024 and FY2025. As James Walkinshaw says: “contrary to what Stewart said, every year I’ve been on the board of supervisors, the budget for the police department has gone up.” Also from Walkinshaw: “I represent the safest police district in the safest large jurisdiction of the United States of America. And why is Fairfax County the safest jurisdiction in the United States of America? It’s because we invest in our police department”  As for ‘Sanctuary City’ policies, in fact, data show that these policies actually “make communities safer, healthier and more prosperous.” Just verifiable/demonstrable lie after verifiable/demonstrable lie from Whitson…)
2. “…to fix the housing shortage, we need to really fix three different problems. Number one, we have to lower taxes. Number two, we have to rein in reckless spending…” (Whitson’s answer to everything is to cut taxes, but he never talks about how to pay for crucial services like schools, public safety, etc., when revenues are slashed. As for his prescription to “rein in reckless” spending, for starters there’s no evidence that Fairfax County is engaging in “reckless” spending, but even if it were and even if that were cut, how would that help to fix the housing shortage in the county? Presumably, it would mean LESS money for affordable housing, right? So…???)
3. “If we rein in reckless spending, that will reduce inflation. And if we induce reduce inflation, that will bring down the mortgage rate.” (In fact, spending by a locality has zero impact on the inflation rate, which is a national phenomenon, and at present is being fueled by Trump’s tariffs – a major tax increase on Americans – to a large degree. Is Whitson opposed to those tariffs? Of course not, because as he said, he doesn’t disagree with ANYTHING Trump has done! As for inflation during the Biden administration, that was overwhelmingly due to two factors: 1) worldwide supply-chain issues coming out of the COVID pandemic; 2) strong recovery in economic activity and *demand* for goods and services)
4. “So, no, the passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill did not cut Medicaid. So even after passage – and this is a talking point that’s parroted time and time again by the left – but it did not cut Medicaid. And so the One Big Beautiful Bill, even after that Medicaid is going to go up by 25%, even after the One Big Beautiful bill. And here’s another key – no one will lose covered Medicaid coverage who’s legally entitled to it because of the the actions in the One Big Beautiful Bill. But the people that will use will lose Medicaid coverage are people that aren’t. And so that includes 1.4 million illegal aliens that receiving Medicaid coverage.” (So basically every word of this is wildly false. In fact, “The Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) latest cost estimate shows that the reconciliation package would reduce federal Medicaid spending over a decade by an estimated $911 billion (after accounting for interactions that produce overlapping reductions across different provisions of the law) and increase the number of uninsured people by 10 million.” That’s just the reality, no matter how much MAGA cultists like Stewart Whitson try to gaslight everybody. As for Medicaid supposedly covering “illegal aliens,” in fact, “People living in the U.S. illegally are not eligible to receive Medicaid benefits other than for emergency medical services.” So basically, Whitson just spews out right-wing b.s. and talking points. Why would anyone want a US Representative like that???)
5. “What we have right now is we have a radical leadership at the top of the Fairfax County public school system who’s hijacked a great education system filled with great teachers and great staff and great coaches. They’ve hijacked that to try to take a political to try to score political points against the president. And so, what’s happening is they are voluntarily taking on the administration. So, they’re going to bring a lawsuit. They’re going to lose $160 million of federal funding. And what are they doing that for? What are they fighting for? They’re fighting to give boys the right to be in girls locker rooms. That’s what they’re fighting for.” (Here’s James Walkinshaw’s response, which is excellent: “I don’t think Stewart addressed the question about the importance of Title One funding, but he did misstate the situation with respect to Fairfax County Public Schools. First of all, our schools remain world class to this day. They continue to outpace almost all of the schools in the Commonwealth of Virginia, including those schools with school board members dominated by folks from Stewart’s party. We beat them every day. Test scores, graduation rates. Our schools are world class. It’s also the reason businesses from across the world come here to Fairfax County. They recognize, the market recognizes, what politicians like Glenn Youngkn and Stewart don’t, that we have great schools. And far from voluntarily taking on a lawsuit, the Trump administration handpicked a handful of school districts because like Stewart, they virilently cannot stand Democrats. They handpicked a handful of school districts led by Democrats and singled them out to attack our schools and attack our kids. The policies in our schools are consistent with federal law and state law. And what the Trump administration is asking would violate federal law and state law. In Fairfax County, we protect every resident of our community. We protect their privacy as our school policies do and we protect their safety. Title One funding is at risk. It was underfunded before the Trump administration and now they’re attempting to take it away entirely. It is a vital lifeline for low-income students across Fairfax County and we have to fight the cuts.”)
6. “I think you short term, tariffs are bringing in a lot of revenue. But I would make sure you understand tariffs in the context of how the president is using them. And so I think he’s using them in a couple different ways. So part of it is creating what they call reciprocity. And so for years and years other countries have charged us exuberant tariffs. So huge amounts of money to us. But we haven’t done the same. And so what the president is trying to do is is make an equal playing field. He’s trying to make if one country is charging us 10%, then he thinks it’s fair for the US to charge that country 10%. He’s trying to create that that parity between the two. The other thing the president doing is he’s a negotiator. And so if countries are taking advantage of us, he’s coming in with a negotiating position and he’s getting them to come to the table and meet him halfway. And so again, the economic benefits, I’m not an expert on tariffs, but I will say the reporting, there was a lot of doom and gloom reported that that would, you know, supposedly come from this. So far, we’ve seen a lot of revenue raised.” (Again, let’s hear what James Walkinshaw said, because he nails it: “So the first thing to understand about a tariff is it’s just a fancy word for a tax. And it’s a tax that ultimately consumers are paying and will continue to pay. And it’s the worst kind of tax. Nobody likes any kind of tax, but a tariff is the worst kind of tax, because it is a regressive tax, because low and moderate income households in this country spend a higher percentage of their income on the durable goods, cars, dishwashers, shoes, clothes than higher income families do who spend more of their income on services. So, it is a tax that is hitting working families hard to the tune of $1,200 a year. And look, there are times when a targeted tariff strategy can make sense. I would be open and would even support a targeted tariff policy to address China’s cheating in the global trade regime. There is no question Donald Trump is right about that – China cheats when it comes to trade. But the way to take on China and beat them is to build alliances to work with our allies and use the combined market pressure of the United States and our allies to put real pressure on China. Instead, we have tariffs on Canada. We should be working with Canada. We’re putting tariffs on Japan. We should be working with Japan to stick it to China. Trump is losing the trade war to China.”)
7. Whitson spewed out all kinds of b.s. and lies about immigration, including – of course – blaming the Biden administration for anything/everything. (Again, here’s James Walkinshaw’s excellent comments on this subject: “I think it’s important to note why Congress has failed to pass comprehensive immigration reform. Because before the 2024 election, there was bipartisan legislation in Congress in Congress that took ideas from Republicans to strengthen the border and crack down on some forms of immigration and ideas from Democrats to increase the amount of legal immigration, the immigration we all claim that we want to see to bring high-skilled workers into this country to fill jobs that need to be filled. There was a bipartisan coalition in the Senate for that bill and it could have been passed and it could have been signed into law. Joe Biden would have signed it. Why didn’t it pass? Because Donald Trump intervened. He called the Senate Republicans and said, ‘Don’t pass this immigration bill because it will be bad for my election chances. Because I need to do what Stewart’s doing here tonight, which is use this immigration issue for politics.’ That’s why we don’t have comprehensive immigration reform in this country right now. So, we have to call that out and we got to get beyond that. I support comprehensive immigration reform that strengthens the border and expands legal immigration and develops a system of immigration that works. Because right now, for people who try to go by the rules, it doesn’t work. I can tell you, I’ve worked on those cases in Congressman Connolly’s office. That’s the kind of immigration reform we need.” I’d just add that immigration is a huge net POSITIVE for our country, and I really wish Democrats would emphasize that more…)
8. “…everything that’s going on in DC is completely in accordance with law from what I can tell. And it’s actually doing, you know, very positive things. It’s stopping crime. It’s saving lives.” (Walkinshaw’s response nails it again: ” So I think all of us can agree that there are times when it is appropriate for the National Guard to respond to a national emergency or even to respond to a significant outbreak of violence anywhere in the United States. Although I wouldn’t say those situations are routine. They’ve been relatively rare in our history. What we’re seeing right now with the Trump administration in Washington DC is not routine. It is quite frankly a political effort. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the president made this announcement and decision on the same day that we learned that inflation is rising and prices are going up on American families. The crime rate in the District of Columbia began to increase while Donald Trump was in was president as did the national violent crime rate. Thankfully, during the Biden administration, those numbers started to come down. And in the District of Columbia, although crime is certainly higher there than we would tolerate here in Fairfax County, the crime rate is at a 30-year low. So, crime is on the way down. And I was in Washington DC earlier today, and what I saw were National Guard troops who I have tremendous respect for, who are highly trained to accomplish their missions. Their mission is not standing in front of Union Station taking pictures with tourists or having their picture taken by tourists. We have federal DEA agents standing around in DC. They should be in communities across this country stopping fentanyl and addressing actual crime. They’re standing around to create TV for the president.”)
9. ” I oppose the John Lewis Voting Rights Act because that was HR1 when the Democrats were back in control of Congress. And so, the reason is it is basically what that act did is it tried to push policy….So the John Lewis Act was basically an attempt by the Democrats to push their version of what they think the election law should be on all the states across the country. And so that’s not right. And so I oppose that. And so part of the the in that law was extending section two of the Voting Rights Act to to basically allow to force states to get preapproval from DOJ. So from a, you know, bureaucrat basically in DC to give pre-approval before a state can pass an election law. And so that’s wrong.” (Really can’t top James Walkinshaw’s superb response here: “On January 6, 2021, a terrible crime was committed in DC when insurrectionists attacked our Capitol, and they beat police officers and police officers died. And President Trump pardoned every single one of those criminals, including those that beat police officers. But we should ask ourselves, why did they attack the Capitol? Why did they attack those police officers? They did so because of the Big Lie of 2020 that Donald Trump spread and that Stewart has repeated here tonight. States did NOT ignore election laws in the 2020 election. This was litigated, litigated, litigated. Not a single court has determined that states ignored their election laws in 2020. The 2020 election was free and fair, and Donald Trump lost. Whatever Trump, Vladimir Putin, or Stewart Witson might think. I do support the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. Among other things, it would end partisan gerrymandering, a topic that’s in the news a lot today. And we hear sometimes blaming both sides as if Democrats and Republicans both gerrymander. Democrats in Congress have voted twice to ban partisan gerrymandering. Not a single Republican voted for it.”)
10. “I just want to take a moment to say thank you to the ICE, all the ICE officers, all the law enforcement officers, all the others who are working so hard to bring order back to our country and to get violent murderers, violent rapists, pedophiles, and others off our street. Thank you so much for the hard work you do. I’m sorry that some people in in Congress don’t support you. I’m sorry that people throw rocks at you. I’m sorry that people threaten you and yell at you as you’re doing your job, but just know that there’s many of us that appreciate you and we’re grateful for what you’re doing and we appreciate what you’re doing to help make us safe.” (Hard to know where to start here, but the bottom line is NOT that any Democrat opposes getting “violent murderers, violent rapists, pedophiles, and others off our street,” it’s that: 1) we believe in the rule of law, including due process for *everyone*; 2) we do NOT believe in plainclothes, masked, unidentified people – we don’t even know if they’re DHS, ICE, etc. – grabbing people off the streets, whether they’re criminals or not; 3) we do NOT believe that the focus of the federal government should be on people just trying to do their jobs, working hard, trying to make a better life for their families, but that the focus should be on violent criminals…but that’s not what the Trump administration is doing; 4) we certainly don’t believe in sending people, against court orders and with no due process, to an El Salvadoran torture prison or “Alligator Alcatraz” or whatever, especially when the vast majority of those people have no criminal records. Also, again, *REPUBLICANS* have been the ones who, time and time again over the past couple decades, have KILLED comprehensive immigration reform, because they’d much rather keep this as a fear mongering political issue for themselves than to actually work to solve the problem. That certainly describes Stewart Whitson’s attitude, and is just one of MANY reasons why everyone in VA11 should make sure to vote for James Walkinshaw on our before September 9!)