Republican Glenn Youngkin wins Virginia gubernatorial election, reports a number of media outlets. The victory could be a warning to the Democrats before the by-elections next year.
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He is the first Republican to win an election in one of the top positions in Virginia since 2009.
The state election, which President Joe Biden won by 10 percentage points last year, was seen in advance as a possible pointer to where voters in the country stand, barely a year into the 78-year-old’s presidency.
Democrats and candidate Terry McAuliffe, who was the state governor between 2014 and 2018, were expected to win the election early, but opinion polls became smoother and smoother towards election day.
Youngkin, who is a newcomer to politics, has received support from former President Donald Trump and has avoided criticizing him. Nevertheless, he has managed to distance himself from the former president, who is unpopular with center-right voters in the state.
Among other things, Youngkin has campaigned to stop learning so-called “critical race theory” in schools, which many have advocated in many states, including Virginia. He has also supported a business-friendly economic policy, said that he is against abortion in most cases and has marked himself as an opponent of vaccine requirements and orders to use bandages.
In addition to the defeat in Virginia, it is smoother than expected in the gubernatorial election in New Jersey, where Democrat Phil Murphy is trying to become the first Democratic governor to win re-election in more than four decades.
There is a close relationship between Jack Ciattarelli, who according to NBC leads with 50 percent ahead of the Democrat Philip Murphy, who has 49 percent of the vote.
Here, the major American media companies have not yet announced a winner.
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