Democrat Spanberger wins Virginia governor race : NPR

Democrat Abigail Spanberger will be Virginia’s next governor, according to a race call by the Associated Press.

Spanberger, who previously served three terms in the U.S. House, defeated her Republican opponent, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears. She’ll be Virginia’s first woman governor.

The contest received national attention as one of the first major tests of voter sentiment in response to the Trump administration’s policies.

Virginia is home to around 320,000 federal workers and hundreds of thousands of federal contractors. On the campaign trail, Spanberger argued that federal layoffs, cutbacks by President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), tariffs, and the federal shutdown were an attack on the Virginia economy — and pitched herself as a way for voters to push back.

“We need a governor who will recognize the hardship of this moment, advocate for Virginians, and make clear that not only are we watching people be challenged in their livelihoods and in their businesses and in communities, but Virginia’s economy is under attack,” Spanberger said at a stop on a campaign bus tour late last month.

That message resonated with Haley Morgan Wright, a voter whose husband is a federal employee currently working without pay during the federal shutdown. She wants Spanberger to use her platform as governor to uplift the stories of civil servants like him.

“He cares about his country, he wants to serve his country and has opted to do it in this way,” she said after casting a ballot in the Northern Virginia exurbs. “He’s not superfluous.”

Spanberger was backed by national Democrats

National Democrats had looked to Spanberger and Virginia Democrats for a boost heading into the 2026 midterms. Former President Barack Obama had campaigned for her and the party backed her in what was one of just two governor’s races this year.

Voters cast their ballots at Huguenot High School on Tuesday in Richmond, Virginia.

Ryan M. Kelly/VPM News

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Ryan M. Kelly/VPM News

“The DNC has been spending a lot of money and a lot of time in Virginia,” said DNC Vice Chair Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta at a meeting for party volunteers in Northern Virginia. “Because we know that what you all do and the momentum that is going to come out of your victories is going lead to us flipping the House of Representatives in 2026.”

In 2021, Republican Glenn Youngkin defeated Democrat Terry McAuliffe with 50.6% of the vote to 48.7%. Virginia governors are limited to one four-year term.

Spanberger, who served in the CIA before running for Congress in 2018, has cultivated a reputation as a pragmatic centrist. The theme of her run for governor was “affordability” — speaking to Virginians’ concerns about rising costs of housing, utility bills, pharmaceutical drugs, and the economic uncertainty she blamed on Trump’s tariffs and federal layoffs.

Earle-Sears, meanwhile, portrayed herself as an example of the American dream — a Jamaican immigrant who became a U.S. Marine and small business owner.

She accused Spanberger of backing policies on transgender rights that she said are a threat to girls’ safety in school bathrooms and locker rooms.

“Love is not having my daughter having to be forced to undress in a locker room with a man. That’s not love,” Earle-Sears said at a rally in late October. “Love is making sure that our girl children have opportunities in sports and are not forced to play against biological males.”

Earle-Sears’ stance on transgender students in girls’ bathrooms sounded good to Elizabeth Drake, a voter who said she works with youth at a church in Loudoun County.

“I feel like we’re actually going back and setting ourselves back a lot by endangering women,” she said. “I’m not saying that that doesn’t mean we can have alternative spaces for people, but the women’s locker rooms, women’s bathrooms, women’s safe homes are not it.”

Winsome Earle-Sears, currently Virginia’s lieutenant governor, in the Virginia General Assembly last month.

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Shaban Athuman/VPM News

The race was jolted by late-breaking events

She also attacked Spanberger for supporting Biden administration policies. She vowed to continue business-friendly polices of outgoing Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin. While she backed Trump’s policies, Trump did not endorse her.

Several developments impacted the final weeks of the race. The federal shutdown shadowed the final month of early voting, with both campaigns blaming the other party for the stalemate.

Virginia lawmakers began considering a plan to redistrict the state’s congressional districts to favor Democratic candidates in the 2026 midterm elections, as President Trump pushes Republicans in other states to move to favor their candidates. That could be an issue facing the next Virginia governor.

Former President Barack Obama campaigned for Spanberger over the weekend.

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Steve Helber/AP

And Republicans seized on revelations of text messages by Democratic candidate for attorney general, Jay Jones, in which he described the hypothetical shooting of a Republican lawmaker. Spanberger denounced the messages though Earle-Sears faulted her for not calling on Jones to drop out of the race.

Jones was in a tight race Tuesday against Republican incumbent Jason Miyares for the attorney general’s office.

Margaret Barthel covers Virginia politics for WAMU.