By Arlen Grossman

Tuesday’s battle for governor of Virginia will give us some early indication of potential trouble for the Democratic Party in the upcoming 2022 and 2024 elections. Democrat and former governor Terry McAulliffe is a decent candidate and Virginia has been turning blue for several election cycles. But the Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin has been running neck and neck with McAuliffe and the race now is a tossup. Joe Biden won Virginia by ten points in 2020. And although Youngkin has tried to distance himself from Donald Trump, the former president has made a point of endorsing the Republican.

My concern is that as toxic and uninspiring as the Republican Party has been since Trump’s election in 2020, this race shouldn’t be this close. But with Biden’s approval numbers sliding downward and the constant attacks from the right-wing media (see “It’s the Media, Stupid!”post above), the Democrats could lose this race. If they do lose, it would be a bad sign for the party. Ideally they could learn something useful and maybe they could learn some new strategies.

But as worthless and awful as the Republican Party is these days, the fact that the election is as close as is, tells us the Democratic Party is not where it should be, and dangerous times could be ahead. If Trump’s people gain one or both houses of Congress, democracy will not be guaranteed any more in this country.