Bob McDonnell scores win in Virginia
Republicans swept Virginia's statewide elections Tuesday, with gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell leading his party's ticket to victory up and down the ballot and scoring an early win for the national GOP.
McDonnell, a former state attorney general, won a decisive victory over Democratic state Sen. Creigh Deeds, bringing an end to eight years of Democratic control of the governor's office in Richmond and breaking a series of disappointing elections for Virginia Republicans.
Just a year after President Obama won the state's electoral votes for the Democratic Party for the first time in 44 years, McDonnell, incumbent Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling and Republican attorney general candidate Ken Cuccinelli were elected easily over their Democratic opponents.
Network exit polls showed a starkly different electorate went to the polls in Virginia Tuesday than the one that elected President Barack Obama in 2008. The proportion of voters under 30 dropped from 21 percent in 2008 to 10 percent today. Just 15 percent of the Virginia electorate was black this year, compared with 20 percent last year.
The Virginia governor's race was one of three closely fought elections unfolding Tuesday night. Along with New Jersey's gubernatorial campaign and a special congressional race in upstate New York, the Virginia contest has been closely watched for insight into the mood of the country, a year after President Barack Obama's election last November.
Polls closed in New Jersey at 8 p.m., where incumbent Gov. Jon Corzine has been locked in a close battle for reelection against Republican prosecutor Chris Christie. The two have been trading leads within the margin of error for weeks.
In a third contest - a special congressional election in New York's 23rd district - Democratic House candidate Bill Owens appeared to be lagging Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman in polling and turnout Tuesday. If the GOP sweeps all three elections Tuesday, it could be considered a sign of rising voter discontent with the Democratic Party's performance in Washington.
The White House played down the importance of all three contests Tuesday, with spokesman Robert Gibbs urging reporters not to read the evening's returns as a referendum on the president and his party.
"I don't think, looking at the two gubernatorial races, you can draw with any great insight what's going to happen a year from now," Gibbs said.
Tuesday evening, the president's spokesman told POLITICO Obama wasn't following the results tonight closely, explaining: "He's not watching returns."
Early exit polling reported by CNN Tuesday evening suggested voters were not intentionally trying to send message to the White House with their ballots: 55 percent of voters in Virginia and 60 percent of voters in New Jersey said their feelings toward the president did not weigh on their decision.
Among the remaining respondents, there was a close to even split between voters who said they were trying to support the president with their vote and those who were trying to rebuke him. In Virginia, 18 percent said they were trying to send the Obama administration a positive message, compared with 24 percent who said the opposite. In New Jersey, those numbers were 19 and 20 percent, respectively.
But House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.), told McDonnell supporters in Richmond that they had sent a message to national politicians: "Enough with the incredible reach of government into our lives."
"Bob McDonnell has led us to victory after eight dark years in the wilderness," Cantor said, praising the governor-elect for running a kitchen-table campaign focused on economic issues: "You know what's so great: Bob ran a great campaign, but it was also a positive campaign."
Leading figures from both parties have hit the campaign trail in recent days in all three key elections, including Vice President Biden, who stumped in New York 23rd congressional district for Democrat Bill Owens on Monday, and former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson, who appeared later in the day for Owens's opponent, Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman.
Speaking with POLITICO Tuesday, Hoffman painted his bid for Congress as the first stage of a national campaign to return Congress to conservative hands.
"Hopefully the Republican party, of which I’m a lifelong member, utilizes this energy and excitement of people coming to my support because we’ll need it in 2010," he said. "We’re just standing up for the core values that made America strong – less government, less taxes, less spending."
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