Today is election day in Virginia; polls are open from 6 am to 7 pm, as always, and you can vote at your regular polling location. Obviously, the three statewide contests – for Governor (Abigail Spanberger vs. Winsome Earle-Sears), Lt. Governor (Ghazala Hashmi vs. John Reid) and Attorney General (Jay Jones vs. Jason Miyares) – are getting a ton of attention, but there are also a bunch of hotly contested House of Delegates seats as Democrats fight to hold/expand their narrow 51-49 majority. The races I’ll be watching most closely today include the following (other districts are mostly “safe” for one party or the other):
- House of Delegates races in HD22 – Prince William County (Elizabeth Guzman vs. Republican incumbent Del. Ian Lovejoy), HD30 – western Loudoun/northern Fauquier (John McAuliff vs. Republican incumbent Del. Geary Higgins), HD41- Roanoke County/Montgomery (Lily Franklin vs. Republican incumbent Del. Chris Obenshain), HD57 Henrico/eastern Goochland (May Nivar vs. Republican incumbent Del. David Owen), HD64 (Stacey Carroll vs. Republican incumbent Del. Paul Milde), HD66 – eastern Spotsylvania/southern Caroline (Nicole Cole vs. Republican incumbent Del. Bobby Orrock), HD69 – York (Mark Downey vs. Republican incumbent Del. Chad Green), HD71 – Williamsburg/eastern New Kent (Jessica Anderson vs. Republican incumbent Del. Amanda Batten), HD73 – western Chesterfield (Leslie Mehta vs. Republican incumbent Del. Mark Earley, Jr.), HD75 – Hopewell/eastern Chesterfield (Lindsey Dougherty vs. Republican incumbent Del. Carrie Coyner), HD82 – Petersburg area (Kimberly Pope Adams vs. Republican incumbent Del. Kim Taylor), HD86 – Poquoson/eastern Hampton (Virgil Thornton vs. Republican incumbent Del. A.C. Cordoza) , HD89 – southern Suffolk/western Chesapeake (Karen Carnegie vs. Republican Mike Lamonea)…also HD97 – Virginia Beach (Del. Michael Feggans vs. former Republican Del. Tim Anderson).
As Virginia political analyst Sam Shirazi says, “I think if there’s a really good night, Democrats winning by 10% or Spanberger is winning by 10% or more, that’s where we start getting into the 60-seat territory. And the Democrats are certainly playing to win a lot of seats.” Also note that Chaz Nuttycombe’s State Navigate has Democrats favored to win 60 House of Delegates seats, which would represent a gain of 9 seats from the current 51 Democrats to 49 Republicans breakdown in the House of Delegates. The State Navigate model has the 13 districts listed above as favored to go “blue” by the following percentages:
- HD22: 68% likelihood of Democrat Elizabeth Guzman winning
- HD30: 50% likelihood of Democrat John McAuliff winning
- HD41: 66% likelihood of Democrat Lily Franklin winning
- HD57: 89% likelihood of Democrat May Nivar winning
- HD64: 43% likelihood of Democrat Stacey Carroll winning
- HD66: 32% likelihood of Democrat Nicole Cole winning
- HD69: 44% likelihood of Democrat Mark Downey winning
- HD71: 79% likelihood of Democrat Jessica Anderson winning
- HD73: 42% likelihood of Democrat Leslie Mehta winning
- HD75: 65% likelihood of Democrat Lindsey Dougherty winning
- HD82: 79% likelihood of Democrat Kimberly Pope Adams winning
- HD86: 55% likelihood of Democrat Virgil Thornton winning
- HD89: 77% likelihood of Democrat Karen Carnegie winning
(Also note that HD97, held by incumbent Democratic Del. Michael Feggans, is favored to remain blue with a 94% likelihood)
As for the statewide races, State Navigate now has the chances of Spanberger winning at 98%; Hashmi at 88%; and Jones at 67%. The first two are similar to the betting markets (e.g., PredictIt, Polymarket and Kalshi), but in the AG race, the betting markets generally had Jones down in the 33%-40% territory for a while, since the scandal over Jones’ violence-wishing texts to Del. Carrie Coyner came to light, but since the Emerson Poll showing Jones up 2 points, he’s bounced into the 40%s. For the latest polls and polling average, see FiftyPlusOne, which as of Sunday had Spanberger +11 points.
In terms of fundraising, per VPAP, Abigail Spanberger had outraised Winsome Earle-Sears $62M to $37M as of 10/23; Ghazala Hashmi had outraised John Reid $8.3M to $1.7M as of 10/23; Jason Miyares had outraised Jay Jones $24M to $14M as of 10/23; and House of Delegates Democratic candidates had outraised House of Delegates Republican candidates by a massive $66.2M to $26.2M as of 10/23.
So how many will end up voting today? As of 11/2, over 1.4 million had voted early, which is ahead of the pace four years ago (most likely, early voting will hit 1.5 million when all is said and done, including mail-in votes arriving before, on, or after election day). Also note that four years ago, over 3.28 million total votes were cast, “exceeding the 2017 gubernatorial election total by roughly 625,000 and exceeding all other previous Virginia gubernatorial elections by over a million.” We’ll see how turnout does this time around – and also which party’s “base” is more energized (as of 10/29, according to VPAP, Virginia early voting had Dems at 667k and Repubicans at 463k, for a 200k+ lead for Democrats…which should expand to 250k or so after the final weekend and the rest of mail is added – so a big head start for Democrats heading into election day).
With that…what are you seeing and hearing out there? What’s turnout like in your neck of the woods? Who did you vote for and why? Feel free to add your observations in the comments section (I’ll be updating there throughout the day).
P.S. See here (Uncrewed) for an excellent rundown of the House of Delegates races., which has Democrats picking up 10 seats (HD22, HD30, HD41, HD57, HD71, HD73, HD75, HD82, HD86, and HD89, with Democrats hitting 61 out of 100. According to Uncrewed, “It’s kind of hard to overstate how screwed the Virginia Republicans are on Tuesday,” due to “an unpopular President in Washington, an unpopular gubernatorial candidate, and the generic House of Delegates ballot tracking very close to the performance of said unpopular gubernatorial candidate.” As a result of those factors, Uncrewed has “Democrats flipping 10 seats, but they could flip three more if Spanberger wins in a landslide.” Also see the State Navigate House of Delegates forecast, which has Democrats favored to win 60 seats, with a 94% chance of winning the chamber and a 12% chance of winning a supermajority.
P.P.S. See here for Chaz Nuttycombe’s spreadsheet of turnout reports for election day.
