OPINION:
Ed Gillespie, Virginia’s newest losing governor wanna-be — who went down in flames to Democrat Ralph Northam — will be talked about for days as the Voter Referendum on President Donald Trump.
He’ll be the go-to guy for mainstream media when it needs to show just how hated Trump has become with the average American.
But his loss has less to do with Trump and more to do with Virginia’s shifting demographics — with Virginia’s proximity to Big Government jobs.
Look, Gillespie was no MAGA supporter. He wasn’t a Trump fan. He was about as establishment Republican as they come.
And his win doesn’t say Trump is faltering among the people.
It rather says what Virginians have known for some time — that the state, particularly the northern Virginian part of the state — has become overrun with government workers who oftentimes vote Democrat out of concern for their jobs.
The state, once pretty red, has moved blue in key, heavily populated spots. Why? As government expands, the need for access to government jobs expands. Northern Virginia’s proximity to the largest government hub in the country, Washington, D.C., makes it an attractive spot to live.
“[F]rom 1952 through 2004,” 270towin wrote, “Virginia was reliably Republican (except for the landslide of Lundon Johnson over Barry Goldwater in 1964). What changed? … Shifting demographics, including more rapid population growth around Washington, D.C., have made the state a battleground in recent elections, perhaps one that now leans Democratic again. Barack Obama won [Virginia] twice and Hillary Clinton made it three in a row for Democrats, winning by about 5.5 percent over Donald Trump in 2016.”
In other words, Virginia is not really dominated by Trump people in the first place — at least, if you look at recent voting records.
Virginia’s race was a stamp of approval on Big Government, by those who benefit most from Big Government — the government workers who’ve come in droves to the state in the last few years.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.