A state legislator since 2006, Gilbert has risen quickly through the GOP House leadership. He served as Republican leader of the House for two terms before ascending to the powerful speakership in 2022 following the party regaining majority control of the chamber.
The Shenandoah Valley conservative is a key ally of Gov. Glenn Youngkin, who has advocated for tax cuts.
Gilbert’s past awards include being named legislator of the year by The Family Foundation and the Virginia State Police Association, among other groups. Gilbert holds an A-plus rating from the National Rifle Association and in 2017 was presented the NRA’s Defender of Freedom award. In 2022, he received an A-plus from the Virginia Chamber of Commerce for his pro-business stances.
He received his bachelor’s degree in government from the University of Virginia and earned his law degree from Southern Methodist University. He served as an assistant commonwealth’s attorney in Lynchburg and Shenandoah County, and now has a private law practice in Woodstock.
This story has been updated to include the House of Delegates Health, Welfare and Institutions committee meeting on Tuesday.
On April 1, 2020, Dr. Lorna Breen returned to work, with COVID but fever-free. It was the first wave of the U.S. pandemic, and New York was on its way to becoming an epicenter. Nearly 1,400 people had already died from COVID in the city in just a few weeks, and as medical director of the emergency department at NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital in Manhattan, Breen was among the front-line doctors treating the growing number of COVID patients.
About eight days after returning to work, Breen hit a breaking point. Her family arranged to bring her back to Virginia and secured psychiatric care for her from the University of Virginia Health System, recalled Corey Feist, Breen’s brother-in-law and the president and co-founder of the Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes’ Foundation.
“Once we obtained that care and she started to improve, she immediately said to us, ‘Now that I have obtained mental health care, this is going to impact my career and my license to practice medicine,’” Feist said. “And it was one of the last things she told us.”
On April 26, 2020, shortly after being discharged, Breen took her life at her family’s Charlottesville home.
“That is a difference in health care professionals, like doctors and nurses,” Feist said. “They don’t see a different career in their life. This is what they’re about. And so their identity becomes inextricably linked with their profession, and when you take away their ability to serve in that profession, you take everything away from them. It is one and the same. This is exactly what happened to my sister in-law, and sadly, this is exactly what happens to thousands of health care workers across the country.”
Breen’s fear that seeking help meant she could lose her license is a common one among health care professionals, largely a result of questions about seeking mental health treatment on state medical licensing applications, including Virginia’s. This concern contributes to a mental illness stigma and burnout in the field, and ultimately, reduces the public’s access to health care, industry professionals say.
In a move meant to destigmatize seeking mental health help in the health care field, Virginia could change that language in its health care worker licensing applications this year, should new legislation pass.
HB 1573 — approved by a Virginia House of Delegates subcommittee on Jan. 19 — and its companion bill in the state Senate, SB 970, would direct “the Department of Health Professions to amend its licensure, certification and registration applications to remove any existing questions pertaining to mental health conditions and impairment.”
Instead, those applications would ask:
Do you have any reason to believe that you would pose a risk to the safety or well-being of your patients or clients?
Are you able to perform the essential functions of a practitioner in your area of practice with or without reasonable accommodation?
The Medical Society of Virginia provided the language for the bill.
“This is a simple thing we can do to encourage people to get treatment,” said Clark Barrineau, MSV’s assistant vice president of government affairs and public policy.
Del. Wendell S. Walker, R-Lynchburg, who introduced the House bill, said, “Virginia’s current language affirms the beliefs that mental health illness underlines a health care provider’s ability to do their job. … Such questions on this license application may cause physicians to forgo seeking psychological, psychiatric care, when they’re suffering from depression, anxiety, or just professional burnout, for fear of losing … their license.”
The bill also contains an emergency clause that would make the law take effect immediately after Gov. Glenn Youngkin signed it.
On Thursday, the Virginia House’s Health, Welfare and Institutions Subcommittee No. 3 voted unanimously to recommend that the full committee report the bill. On Tuesday, the full committee voted to do so unanimously, sending the bill to the House floor. The Senate companion bill, introduced by Sen. Montgomery “Monty” Mason, D-Williamsburg, was assigned to the Health Professions subcommittee of the Senate Education and Health committee, which voted unanimously on Jan. 20 to recommend reporting it to the full committee.
Neighboring states such as North Carolina have changed or removed mental health questions from similar applications for health care worker licensure and certifications, Walker said.
“If these other states are doing it, and we see the concern out here, I just felt like from the responses and what people shared with me, that this is a time that Virginia needs to come around and do the same thing,” he told Virginia Business.
With a shortage of health care professionals, including in his district, providers are working long hours in addition to handling stress and trauma: “There’s no such thing as a 37-, 40-hour workweek when it comes to these providers,” he told Virginia Business.
Stigma contributes to suicide
Virginia’s state license applications ask, “Do you currently have any mental health condition or impairment that affects or limits your ability to perform any of the obligations and responsibilities of professional practice in a safe and competent manner?” The question explains that “currently” means “recently enough” so that the condition could “reasonably” have an impact on the applicant’s ability to function as a practicing physician.
“By this question existing, we know for absolute fact, from our student members, because we represent medical students, and … medical residents … that they don’t go get treatment out of fear of this reality,” Barrineau said. Students and residents fear that they won’t be able to answer the question truthfully and receive their licenses.
Dr. Lorna Breen. Photo courtesy Dr. Lorna Breen Heroes’ Foundation
Feist was among those speaking in favor of the bill Jan. 19.
“This is a law that we are working to pass today that is going to not only save lives of health care workers, but it will benefit patients, because [providers] will be … able to perform at their best,” he told Virginia Business.
The pandemic exacerbated the existing problem. In late May 2022, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy released an advisory titled “Addressing Health Worker Burnout.”
“As the burnout and mental health crisis among health workers worsens,” Murthy wrote, “this will affect the public’s ability to get routine preventive care, emergency care and medical procedures.”
In September 2021, the Virginia Board of Medicine released a brief meant to dispel the misconception that a therapist or colleague would be legally compelled to report a physician seeking help to the state board, telling doctors, “Get help if you need it.”
The American Hospital Association published a study on health care workforce suicide prevention interventions, funded by a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grant, in fall 2022. The study included a survey that received 158 responses, as well as interviews and focus groups conducted March-April 2022.
The study listed the stigma associated with talking about and seeking behavioral health care as one of three primary drivers of suicide among health care workers. Included in that stigma was a fear from clinicians that seeking care could have “a detrimental effect on their ability to renew or retain their state medical license.”
“This [law] is going to knock down the barriers and create a free and clear pathway and a consistent message to health care workers, which is that they must prioritize own well-being so that they can take the best care of patients,” Feist said.
United Virginians
During the Jan. 19 House subcommittee meeting, representatives from the Medical Society of Virginia, the Virginia College of Emergency Physicians and the Virginia Hospital & Healthcare Association spoke in favor of the bill. Representatives from MSV, VHHA and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) advocated for the bill before the Senate subcommittee on Jan. 20.
“I never thought in the 30 years that I’ve been running around here, I would have to spend so much time dealing with suicide and mental health issues, but it is matured ahead of liability issues that we spent a lot of time on over the years,” said Scott Johnson, a partner at Hancock, Daniel & Johnson PC and head of its government relations team who spoke as general counsel to the MSV, on Thursday.
“I think you can ask any physician, throughout the country, we all know somebody who has committed suicide, and a lot of it was during COVID, because we were all overwhelmed,” Dr. Hailey Sparacino, a family care doctor in Lynchburg who also practices advanced surgical obstetrics, told the subcommittee Thursday.
She concluded her remarks by saying, “I think the stigma needs to go away, and I think this bill is a good way to start.”
Like the quote from a possibly apocryphal Harvard Law professor, Virginia legislators can look to their left and then to their right, and one of their peers probably won’t be seated there next year, thanks to a supercharged primary field created by a late 2021 redistricting.
And now, 61 of Virginia’s 140 incumbent state senators and delegates find themselves competing for the same district with other incumbents. Some will face each other in June primaries and others in November general elections, while a few may decide not to run. The outcome is likely to create a major reshuffle in legislative leadership, if not party representation.
State Sen. Joe Morrissey, who faces former Del. Lashrecse Aird in a Democratic primary for the Petersburg Senate seat, welcomes the competition, saying, “We have no right to have a district that just protects us. Let the chips fall where they may.”
Here are just a few of the contested state Senate districts in the 2023 election year featuring familiar names: Democratic state Sens. Louise Lucas and Lionell Spruill Sr. in Hampton Roads; Republican Sens. Ryan McDougle and Minority Leader Tommy Norment in the Peninsula; and in the Roanoke Valley, Democratic Sen. John Edwards vs. Republican Sen. David Suetterlein. Three other sitting senators — Democrat Creigh Deeds and Republicans Emmett Hanger and Mark Obenshain — were in the same Shenandoah Valley district. However,Deeds said he’s moving to Senate District 11, where many of his Charlottesville-area constituents reside, and where he’ll challenge Del. Sally Hudson for the Democratic nomination.
Delegates, too, are facing primary and general election battles, among them Republicans Israel O’Quinn and Will Wampler in Southwest Virginia, Democrats Eileen Filler-Corn and Kathy Tran in Fairfax County, and Luke Torian and Elizabeth Guzman, Democrats representing parts of Prince William County.
In Floyd and Patrick counties, the heat has already risen on the primary contest between Republican Dels. Marie March and Wren Williams. Not only are they seeking the same seat, but March pressed charges against Williams, claiming he slammed her shoulder as the two passed each other at a GOP fundraiser in Wytheville in September 2022. Williams has said he apologized and didn’t realize he had bumped into March, while she claimed it was intentional. On Jan. 4, a Wytheville General District Court judge found Williams not guilty.
“Those Southwest Virginia people, they get pretty fired up,” jokes Del. Hyland “Buddy” Fowler, R-Hanover, suggesting that GOP Del. Thomas Wright, who sits near March and Williams in the House, “will be the referee. We do have to maintain some level of decorum.”
‘Insane’ number of primaries
Tempers aside, an election year often generates more posturing than real legislative action — but some of that depends on the ideological makeup of candidates’ districts.
“I think the conventional wisdom is that it’s a year to do nothing,” says Greg Habeeb, a former Republican delegate and now head of Gentry Locke Attorneys’ Richmond-based government and regulatory affairs team. “It’s a campaign year. There’s an insane number of primaries. There’s going to be huge turnover amongst Senate leadership from the highest levels of the Senate.”
Indeed, Sen. Janet Howell, the Fairfax County Democrat who co-chairs the powerful Senate Finance and Appropriations Committee, has been rumored to be considering retirement, having served in the Senate since 1992. Her new district includes Democratic incumbent state Sen. Jennifer Boysko.
Delegates Marie March and Wren Williams will face each other in a Republican primary for the same seat in Floyd and Patrick counties. March photo by AP Photo/Steve Helber; Williams photo by Allison Lee Isley/The Washington Post via Getty Images
Senate Majority Leader Dick Saslaw, who has served in the Senate since 1980 and turns 82 in February, may also retire. Democratic Sen. Dave Marsden is now in the same Fairfax County district.
University of Mary Washington Professor Stephen Farnsworth says that the newly drawn districts — determined in December 2021 by two Virginia Supreme Court-appointed special masters who did not take incumbents’ residences into consideration — favor Democrats because of population dispersal. Younger, more Democratic-leaning voters live in urban and suburban areas, while more conservative rural regions are losing population and seats, he notes.
“The [Republican] House majority is already at risk because of the lines that have been redrawn,” Farnsworth says. “The reality for a lot of Republicans is that the election that really matters is the primary.”
The state Senate, which Democrats have held in a razor-thin 21-19 majority since Republicans won back the House and the governorship in 2021, is a bit trickier to predict, although Morrissey says he believes Senate Democrats will hang on to power in 2023.
In January, though, voters in U.S. Rep. Jen Kiggans’ former state Senate district will vote for her replacement as the Republican takes office in Washington, D.C. State law requires the Jan. 11 special election to take place in the 2010-drawn 7th District including parts of Virginia Beach and Norfolk, which has gone back and forth between Democratic and Republican control. If Democrat Aaron Rouse, a Virginia Beach councilman, beats Republican candidate Kevin Adams, the Democratic-Republican divide will widen to 22 to 18 this session.
While the change of one Senate seat could make a difference in the fate of some bills in committee, the Senate has been a reliably steady institution, often checking the bolder impulses of the House of Delegates.
“The Senate, no matter who has been in charge, has been the same institution for a long time,” Habeeb says. “The majority-minority changes, but the leadership doesn’t change.”
However, that may not hold true much longer, he adds: “A lot of that’s about to change. A lot of folks are saying that [2023’s] the time to go.”
‘Get out of Richmond’
A major question for candidates, especially Republicans, is how far to push hot-button culture war topics. Common wisdom has it that some Republicans nationwide lost midterm elections by focusing on the premise of a stolen 2020 presidential election, a falsehood promoted by former President Donald Trump.
However, notes David Ramadan, a former Republican delegate who represented parts of Loudoun and Prince William counties, issues like abortion and transgender students’ rights go beyond simple rhetoric for some Republican officeholders and their constituents. “They believe very strongly in what they’re doing. They represent very, very red districts. They don’t go by the national atmosphere, especially in an election year,” says Ramadan, a professor at George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government.
Even controversial bills that are likely to fail or be tabled — such as Republican Sen. Amanda Chase’s measure to prohibit all gender transition treatment for children under age 18 — can serve a role in differentiating candidates from competitors, Ramadan says. “They’re going to go with the far-right issue bills that will help them nail the nomination.”
But this legislative gamesmanship can have real-world effects. Even as Virginians are reeling from two mass shooting events in Charlottesville and Chesapeake late last year, it’s doubtful that a split legislature will pass any gun control legislation, based at least partly on campaign calculations, observers say. “Voting to restrict guns puts your primary renomination at risk if you’re a Republican,” Farnsworth says. “In the history of election-year sessions, [the rule is] do the minimum as fast as possible and get out of Richmond.”
Morrissey says decisions on what bills to file usually come down to a candidate’s priorities, as well as whether they hope to pass legislation via compromise in a divided legislature — although he planned to file a bill that would ban assault-style weapons, which is unlikely to pass.
“When it comes to some of these social issues, it’s fine to have your beliefs on that,” he says. “You don’t ever have to abandon your values, but remember you’re legislating for your entire district or the commonwealth of Virginia. That’s what goes through my head all the time.”
Former Virginia Del. Christopher K. Peace will be the next president of the Council of Independent Colleges in Virginia Inc. (CICV) after the 2023 regular General Assembly session concludes.
“[Chris] is far more than a lobbyist and attorney — he is a strategist with a great grasp of the issues. He carries a reputation as a thoughtful legislator, a relationship builder, avid listener and problem-solver. I am confident he will bring a fresh approach to CICV and for the future of Virginia’s college graduates,” said Scott D. Miller, chair of CICV and president of Virginia Wesleyan University, in a statement.
In July, CICV President Robert M. Lambeth Jr. announced his plans to retire once the organization chose a successor.
“The commonwealth is home to the best collection of institutions of higher education in the nation. CICV’s member institutions contribute greatly to this robust landscape of academic excellence. I’m deeply honored to have been named the next CICV president succeeding Robert,” Peace said in a statement.
Peace currently practices law in the Richmond area from his Mechanicsville office. From 2006 to 2020, he served as a Republican in the House of Delegates, representing the 97th district, which included New Kent County and parts of Hanover and King William counties. He was a member of the House Appropriations committee and chaired the Transportation and the Elementary and Secondary Education subcommittees. Peace also served on the Budget Conference committee. He chaired the House General Laws committee and served on the Health, Welfare and Institutions committee.
Peace is a graduate of Hampden-Sydney College and the University of Richmond School of Law.
Averett University President Tiffany Franks chaired CICV’s search committee, and Washington, D.C.-based executive search firm Academic Search advised CICV.
“Chris Peace is uniquely qualified to serve as president, with multigenerational knowledge of the commonwealth and deep familial ties to CICV member schools,” Franks said in a statement. “He is an accomplished leader with a real understanding of government and politics in Virginia, having been in every corner and hallway.”
Founded in 1971 and based in Bedford, the Council of Independent Colleges in Virginia, also known as Virginia Private Colleges, is a nonprofit organization representing 27 accredited nonprofit private colleges and universities in Virginia.
RICHMOND, Va. – Lawmakers narrowly passed a bill this month that would allow people fired for refusing a COVID-19 vaccine to receive unemployment benefits if no other misconduct took place.
The measure advanced from the House of Delegates on a 51-48 party line vote and was assigned to a Senate committee on Feb. 10.
The bill was one of several introduced by Republicans this session to protect and defend workers who do not want to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
Del. Kathy J. Byron, R-Forest, introduced House Bill 1201 to protect the unvaccinated from potential discrimination. The bill adds a line to the current unemployment misconduct law stating refusal to receive a COVID-19 vaccine does not hinder someone from obtaining unemployment benefits.
Byron said her bill is not an endorsement for or against the vaccine. She is a proponent of the COVID-19 vaccine but said vaccination is a personal choice.
“There are many reasons why people have declined to take it, due to religious reasons and other reasons,” Byron said in a February subcommittee meeting.
The bill preserves a worker’s right to make decisions about their own health, Byron said. However, she said the legislation doesn’t prevent employers from requiring employees to receive a COVID-19 vaccine.
“They are not getting purposely fired so they can go home and collect unemployment,” Byron said. “We need to make sure they have the ability to have benefits until they find another position.”
There is currently no explicit ruling as to whether refusing a COVID-19 vaccine without reason qualifies as misconduct, according to Norfolk-based employment lawyer John M. Bredehoft. Reasons to refuse the vaccine include medical injury, disability, or a “sincere religious objection,” he said.
“Knowing what the rule is has a definite value independent of what the rule would be,” Bredehoft said.
Generally, if someone gets fired, they get unemployment benefits and if they quit, they don’t receive the benefits, Bredehoft said. However, the bill isn’t clear enough, Bredehoft said.
“Let’s be clear. Nobody gets fired for refusal to get vaccinated – period,” Bredehoft said. “People get fired for refusal to be vaccinated when the company has a policy requiring them to be vaccinated.”
Nicole Riley, deputy secretary of labor for Gov. Glenn Youngkin, spoke at the subcommittee meeting. She said the governor’s administration supports the bill.
Virginians have received over 15 million doses of various COVID-19 vaccines, and 71% of the population is fully vaccinated, according to the Virginia Department of Health. Over 80% of the adult population 18 and up is fully vaccinated. A person is considered fully vaccinated by the VDH when they received one dose of a single dose vaccine and both doses of a two dose vaccine.
Del. Don L. Scott, D-Portsmouth, was the only person to question Byron during the subcommittee meeting. No delegates asked questions during subsequent meetings. Scott confirmed with Byron that Youngkin’s administration supports giving unemployment benefits to those who were fired for refusing a COVID-19 vaccine.
The Senate Commerce and Labor committee expected to read the bill meets on Mondays. The bill is one of approximately 70 House measures waiting for the committee’s action.
Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly referred to Nicole Riley as the state director of the National Federation of Independent Businesses. She is now the deputy secretary of labor for Gov. Glenn Youngkin. Capital News Service regrets the error.
Capital News Service is a program of Virginia Commonwealth University’s Robertson School of Media and Culture. Students in the program provide state government coverage for a variety of media outlets in Virginia.
Like the top of the ticket, Virginia’s attorney general and lieutenant governor races were close, but Republicans were ultimately victorious. The party appeared headed to regain control of the Virginia House of Delegates, but The Associated Press said Wednesday morning that several races were too close to call.
However, the state GOP, which swept back into power in Virginia after more than a decade of statewide electoral losses, claimed it had won six seats in the 100-seat house, which would give the party a two-seat margin over Democrats, which held a 55-45 majority for the past two years. The AP had not yet called four of those races as of early Wednesday, though.
Down-ticket statewide races pitted Democratic Attorney General Mark Herring against Republican Del. Jason Miyares, and Republican Winsome Sears vs. Democratic Del. Hala Ayala for the lieutenant governor post, in which either candidate would be the first woman of color to serve in the position.
With 99.7% of Election Day votes and 91% of all early votes counted, Sears held a 51.1% majority over Ayala’s 48.9%. Miyares had 50.87% of the vote, over Herring’s 49.13%, echoing the governor’s race, in which Republican nominee Glenn Youngkin held a 51.07% lead to former Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s 48.23%. Third-party progressive candidate Princess Blanding had 0.69% of the vote after polling at about 1%.
Sears, who was born in Jamaica and became a naturalized U.S. citizen after serving in the Marine Corps, will have significant power as tiebreaker in the Virginia State Senate, where Democrats hold a 21-19 majority. The legislative body, which is elected every four years and faces its next election in 2023, may represent Democrats’ only hope to defeat some GOP initiatives.
Sears declared victory early Wednesday, but Miyares did not take the stage at state Republicans’ celebration, where Youngkin declared he would deliver tax breaks, economic development and jobs, as well as charter schools and more parental involvement in children’s education.
Many incumbent Democratic delegates faced opponents in primaries and in the general election. Some were defeated, including Del. Chris Hurst, D-Blacksburg, who lost by 10 points to Republican Jason Ballard in the 12th District.
Miyares
Democrats regained control of the state legislature in 2020 for the first time in nearly 30 years, an outcome that resulted in part from McAuliffe’s campaigning and fundraising for Democratic delegate candidates after he left office in 2018, as well as demographic shifts in Virginia. With a larger, younger and more liberal Northern Virginia population and shrinking numbers in the more conservative western and Southern regions of the state, the state turned largely blue.
Since 2020, led by Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam, the state has been widely acknowledged as the South’s most progressive state governing body, having enacted sweeping measures, including abolishment of the death penalty to legalizing marijuana and raising the minimum wage. Now, measures that must come up for additional votes — such as commercialization of marijuana — could be in jeopardy.
House leadership would also change if Republicans take control, with House Republican Leader Todd Gilbert of Shenandoah likely to become speaker, replacing Del. Eileen Filler-Corn, D-Fairfax County, the first woman and first Jew to hold the post.
Virginia Democrats’ progressive agenda of the past two years is guaranteed to come to a screeching halt, as control in Richmond will now be dominated by Republicans.
A new statewide poll from Virginia Commonwealth University shows Democratic former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe with a nine-point lead over Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin, a far different take than the much tighter race indicated by a Washington Post-George Mason University poll released Saturday.
VCU’s L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs released its second Virginia gubernatorial poll results Monday, indicating that while McAuliffe has 43% of likely voters’ support and Youngkin only 34%, the attorney general and lieutenant governor races have gotten closer in the past month.
VCU’s August poll showed the two gubernatorial candidates in practically a dead heat, while Democratic Attorney General Mark Herring and lieutenant governor candidate Del. Hala Ayala held 10-point leads over their respective GOP opponents, Del. Jason Miyares and Winsome Sears.
“Our recent poll relative to the governor’s race and statewide elections showed interesting results,” former Virginia Gov. L. Douglas Wilder said in a statement Monday. “Neither McAuliffe nor Youngkin had 50% support. The increase in the undecided and those unable to commit for either is noteworthy. The poll was taken prior to any debates. How the candidates show the people what they propose dealing with the pandemic and its effects are obvious concerns. The narrowing of the lead by the Democratic candidates in the lieutenant governor and attorney general races and increased ‘undecided’ shows ‘the jury’ may be out awhile longer.”
The poll of 811 adults in Virginia was conducted Sept. 7-15 with a margin of error of 5.35%, which increases to 6.93% when considering likely voters only. In the attorney general race, incumbent Herring has a six-point lead over Republican Miyares, 39% to 33%, and Ayala appears to have lost ground against Sears, with a 33% to 30% lead that falls within the margin of error. However, 20% of voters said they remain undecided or unwilling to vote for either lieutenant governor candidate.
It’s a similar story for the two major-party governor contenders; 23% of those polled said they are still undecided or are unwilling to vote for either candidate. A third-party candidate, Princess Blanding, is considered a possible spoiler for McAuliffe among progressive Democratic voters. Blanding — the sister of Virginia teacher Marcus-David Peters, who was killed by a Richmond police officer in 2018 — was not included in Thursday’s first gubernatorial debate, but according to a Youngkin campaign internal poll cited by FiveThirtyEight, her presence could help Youngkin beat McAuliffe.
A poll of 907 likely voters conducted Sept. 7-13 by The Washington Post and GMU’s Schar School of Policy and Government showed McAuliffe with a much narrower lead, 50% over Youngkin’s 47% — within the margin of statistical error. Mark Rozell, the Schar School’s dean, called the race a “toss-up” in the Post.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden’s falling approval numbers may also hamper McAuliffe’s campaign for a second, nonconsecutive term. The Wilder School poll shows 46% of Virginians approving of the job the Democratic Biden is doing, down five points from August — likely influenced by factors such as the U.S. military’s turbulent exit from Afghanistan and increasing disagreements over the Biden administration’s coronavirus responses, including vaccine-or-testing mandates for companies employing 100 or more workers.
In state delegates’ races, Democrats maintained a slight edge over Republicans in the VCU poll, with 43% of respondents saying they’d like the party to retain control next year. Five percent were undecided, and 39% wanted Republicans to regain power in the House. Democrats hold a 55-seat majority in the House of Delegates, and all 100 seats are up for grabs.
Virginia’s early voting period started Sept. 17, and Election Day is Nov. 2.
In a proclamation Thursday, Gov. Ralph Northam said he will call the General Assembly back to work next Wednesday for a special session immediately following the end of the 30-day regular session. In effect, the order will expand the 2021 General Assembly session to its typical length of 46 days.
The reason behind the proclamation is a partisan battle over the length of the regular session this year; usually the 30-day short session is extended to 46 days, but Republicans declined to support the extension measure, which requires two-thirds of the vote by the state Senate and House of Delegates.
In an interview with Virginia Business before this year’s session began, House Minority Leader Todd Gilbert, R-Shenandoah, said that an extended session was not necessary because state legislators met for a record 84-day session last fall and had adjusted the state’s budget to reflect the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. “I don’t know how necessary 2½ months of special session was when, frankly, all Democrats did was make life a lot harder on police and a lot easier on criminals in that special session,” Gilbert added, referring to a large slate of policing and civil rights measures voted in by the Democratic majority after a summer of social justice protests.
Northam said he would call a special session after it became clear Republican lawmakers weren’t going to support lengthening the session, which led to limits on the number of bills delegates and senators could file. Friday is crossover day, the deadline for the House and the Senate to send over passed bills to the other body for consideration. Due to COVID-19 concerns, the state Senate has convened at the Science Museum of Virginia, and the House is convening virtually.
“People across our commonwealth are facing tremendous challenges, and they expect their elected officials to deliver results,” Northam said in a statement Thursday. “I look forward to continuing our work together to move Virginia forward.”
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The poll of 811 adults in Virginia was conducted Sept. 7-15 with a margin of error of 5.35%, which increases to 6.93% when considering likely voters only. In the attorney general race, incumbent Herring has a six-point lead over Republican Miyares, 39% to 33%, and Ayala appears to have lost ground against Sears, with a 33% to 30% lead that falls within the margin of error. However, 20% of voters said they remain undecided or unwilling to vote for either lieutenant governor candidate.