by Kerry Dougherty
In October of 2008 I covered an Obama rally at Harbor Park. It was freezing but the crowd was on fire.
There was electricity in the air. You could sense an Obama victory.
Last night’s Youngkin rally at the oceanfront in Virginia Beach had a similar frisson. And, from the looks of it, the rally that followed in Loudoun County was bigger and even more enthusiastic. Traffic was backed up for miles in Northern Virginia as throngs of supporters headed to Leesburg on Election Eve.
At the Beach there were at least 2,000 people by the time Glenn Youngkin took the stage. And like Obama’s rally in 2008, the mood was upbeat and celebratory.
There was crowd-pleasing music, everything from Michael Jackson’s “Don’t Stop Till You Get Enough” to Neil Diamond’s anthem, “Sweet Caroline.” A single engine plane flew over the ocean toting a red “Youngkin” banner and flags hung from the 31st Street Hilton Hotel.
The warm-up acts were three former governors: Jim Gilmore, Bob McDonnell and George Allen. Jason Miyares, hometown candidate for attorney general, gave a stemwinder speech and introduced his mother who escaped Castro’s Cuba at 19 to come to America. Then it was lieutenant governor candidate Winsome Sears’ turn. This daughter of Jamaican immigrants strode on stage looking more fashionista than former Marine in stunning ivory slacks, stilettos and a satin blouse cinched in at the waist with a wide belt. She too got the crowd rocking.
The star, of course, was the lanky former college basketball player Glenn Youngkin in his iconic vest and open-collared shirt. He gave his Day One pledge: To fire the parole board, to start rolling back taxes and to initiate an audit of the Virginia Employment Commission and the DMV, two of Virginia’s most inefficient departments.
“This is a moment for Virginians to push back on this left, liberal progressive agenda and take our commonwealth back,” he declared, to deafening applause.
“On Day One we’re going to re-establish expectations of excellence in our schools,” he pledged. “When my opponent was governor, 88 schools failed to reach accreditation and rather than do the hard work in fixing them, he just lowered the standards so none would fail.”
“This is OUR moment when we stand up for OUR children. And we decide that we in fact are going to be in charge of our children’s education.”
That brought thunderous applause. The GOP candidate pledged that schools would be open five days a week during a Youngkin administration. No lockdowns. No closures.
Youngkin said he wants to lead a state government that “stops telling us what to do.”
“And that starts with constitutional rights,” Youngkin added. “We know they’ve been trampled. When this governor opened the ABC stores but kept my church closed, when he allowed the FBI to try to silence parents he showed that he doesn’t understand the 1st amendment… We’re going to work to protect our constitution.”
After his speech, Youngkin waded into the crowd for about 45 minutes, signing autographs, posing for selfies and thanking supporters before boarding his campaign bus.
The contrast between Youngkin’s closing arguments and Terry McAuliffe’s couldn’t be starker.
McAuliffe abruptly cancelled a Virginia Beach appearance on Monday. Perhaps he didn’t want crowd size comparisons. And at a campaign stop yesterday in Northern Virginia he actually argued that there are too many white teachers in Virginia schools.
Education may be a major concern to most voters, but THAT seems like an odd issue to raise on the final day of the campaign.
Randi Weingarten spoke at Terry McAuliffe's rally tonight pic.twitter.com/FV8iF1Pvpu
— Corey A. DeAngelis, school choice evangelist (@DeAngelisCorey) November 2, 2021
At a Fairfax County rally Monday evening, McAuliffe was joined by Randi Weingarten, the New Yorker who heads the militant American Federation of Teachers that fought to keep schools closed last year and who has lobbied for harsh restrictions on school children this year as the price of reopening.
Imagine believing that this abrasive union leader would be a vote getter in Virginia.
I once covered a state senate election in which the wife of the winner told me that she knew her husband was going to emerge victorious when she bumped into the wife of his opponent at the polls that morning.
“She had a big run in her stocking,” she whispered to me. “And she didn’t seem to care.”
When I saw that Weingarten was McAuliffe’s closer — the woman responsible for closed schools — I was reminded of the ripped stocking.
Weingarten was a sloppy ending to an error-prone McAuliffe campaign.
This column has been republished with permission from Kerry: Unemployed & Unedited.
