Hampton Roads will be a major battleground as Democrats try to take power in Richmond
The battle for control of the Virginia General Assembly will be largely fought in Hampton Roads on Tuesday. And the question of which side wins will have a lot to do with what kind of laws on guns, voting, abortion and consumer protection Virginians will come under — as well as whether the state ratifies the Equal Rights Amendment and allows people to smoke marijuana without risking jail.
Some two decades of GOP control of the House of Delegates would end if only two districts change. A switch of only one seat in the state Senate would mean a Democratic-controlled body, thanks to Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax’s tie-breaking vote — and that would mean that Democrats hold the governor’s office and both chambers in the General Assembly for the first time since 1993.
The $7.9 million spent campaigning in six targeted Hampton Roads House districts — the 94th in Newport News, where there was a tie vote in 2017, the Hampton-and-Poquoson 91st, the Suffolk-and-Chesapeake 76th, Virginia Beach’s 83rd and 84th and the Norfolk-and-Eastern Shore 100th district — speaks to how fierce the fighting has been during these off-off year elections. So does the $2.9 million spent in three other districts the GOP hopes to win back after losing them in 2016 and 2017: Virginia Beach’s 21st and 85th, and the Newport News-to-Williamsburg 93rd.
Candidates and political scientists who’ve been around say the TV ads and mailers this year are some of the nastiest they’ve seen. Reaction to those may well set the tone when the General Assembly convenes in January, no matter which party has control, they say.
Read more: https://www.pilotonline.com/government/elections/vp-nw-2019-election-walkup-20191103-25mggppykvcvlg5qxhq2iylbq4-story.html
(Norfolk Virginian-Pilot)
