Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Trump should be leading, not lying.

She burned that motherfucker down, and I am so here for it. Thank you, Caroline Kennedy.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

Disagreements are healthy; personal attacks are not.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

You cannot love your country only when you win.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

You are here: Home / Elections 2024 / Virginia Special Election

Virginia Special Election

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Democrats flipped a Virginia State Senate seat that had been held by a Republican.  This victory basically stops Youngkin’s agenda and 15 week abortion ban in its tracks.

 


 

Reader Interactions

54Comments

  5. 5.

    Ohio Mom

    Happy news to end my day with. Probably should put the phone down right now.

    Congrats to the people of Virgina!

  6. 6.

    Planetjanet

    We are fired up and organized in Virginia.  The legislative session begins tomorrow and he may be able to start immediately.

  9. 9.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Geminid:

    Really close margins! Those postcards definitely helped

    @H.E.Wolf:

    I didn’t get any emails from PtV about this special election. Was it for Virginia residents only?

  12. 12.

    LNNVA

    This Virginia Senate seat belonged to Jen Kiggens, who beat Elaine Luria for US Representative VA-02 in November. It was a republican seat, so this is a big pick-up. It gives us 22-18 lead in the Virginia Senate going into next falls elections. Although I live in Albemarle County (Charlottesville), I worked hard for Luria and this helps a bit with the hurt of that loss.

  15. 15.

    eclare

    As I said downstairs, this means women in Eastern TN will be able to go to VA for health care. Yay!

  17. 17.

    Geminid

    The result shifts the Virginia Senate from 21D, 19R to 22-18.

    This will be important in the upcoming session because Senator McClellan is expected to win the late Don McEachin’s 4th CD seat later this winter. That will cut the Democrat’s lead to 21-18 until her seat is filled, but it would have been 20-19 without Rouse’s win.

    Democrats need that extra vote, because Dem Senator Joe Morrissey (D-Jerk) is mad at his party over how they scheduled the 4th CD primary that McLellan won and he lost. Now even if Morrissey wants to make trouble, he can’t help Republicans get bills past Senator Louise Lucas’s Brick Wall.

  19. 19.

    Planetjanet

    @Geminid: He can make a lot of trouble between February 21st and when the special election is held.  A tie vote on abortion is broken by the Lt. Gov.  That is the last whole month of the legislative session.

  22. 22.

    Jess

    Woo-hoo!!!

    Edit: I know we don’t have this in the bag yet, but I’m beginning to believe that the crazies have done all they can in the political sphere, and the voices of reason are peeling back their grip, finger by broken finger. Of course, there will no doubt be more tragic violence and ugliness committed by unmoored Magats, but we will survive.

  24. 24.

    randy khan)

    @Planetjanet:

    Because it’s 22-18 now, assuming the Dems win the House special election and the seat is vacant, the State Senate will be 21-18 during that time, so him voting for Youngkin’s abortion agenda would still mean the Dems would win – 20-19.   But nobody had better miss any sessions.

  27. 27.

    randy khan)

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    He is a famous jerk, on nearly every level, but sadly he keeps getting elected in his district.  People have been highlighting his bad record on abortion (as they should), but that is kind of like the rancid cherry on top of the e. coli sundae.

  29. 29.

    Geminid

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Oh my goodness! Joe Morrissey has a very checkered career. He developed a reputation in Richmond as being the lawyer to choose if you want a Big Jerk on your side. In 2017 Morrissey parleyed that reputation into a Senate seat representing a majority-Black district. He’d been an unreliable State Delegate in years past.

    Morrissey’s been in and out of trouble with the Bar, and did jail time for sleeping with his 17 year-old secretary. They married, he won his Senate seat, and one of Governor Northam’s last official acts was to pardon Morrisey for the crime. There was grumbling at the time, but the pardon may have helped ensure that Morrissey wasn’t a pain in Senate leader Louise Lucas’s ass. His natural inclination is to rock the boat, hard.

  30. 30.

    tobie

    Well done, Virginians. Limiting the damage of Youngkin, protecting women’s rights are very good things.

  32. 32.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Geminid: Really close margins! Those postcards definitely helped

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I didn’t get any emails from PtV about this special election. Was it for Virginia residents only?

     I didn’t get any emails from PtV, either – maybe because it was a relatively small list, given that it was for a state legislative seat.

    I’m hoping that PtV will write for Jennifer McClellan’s special election to the US House. And in the meantime, every state legislative race that Democrats win is another person in the pipeline to statewide and/or national (Congressional) office!

  33. 33.

    Geminid

    From Virginia Democratic Senate leader L. Louise Lucas:

    Brick Wall     1

    Youngkin      0

    @SenLouiseLucas  Jan.10 2023

  34. 34.

    Redshift

    @Planetjanet:

    The legislative session begins tomorrow and he may be able to start immediately.

    Possibly. I was reading that the state senate has a practice of waiting until the election is certified, which won’t happen until next Wednesday. They have seated members before that in a few instances, but they were not in races as close as this one. But since the Dems have the majority, they may be able to make it happen. (I’m not sure what the process is.)

  37. 37.

    James E Powell

    @LNNVA:

    This Virginia Senate seat belonged to Jen Kiggens, who beat Elaine Luria for US Representative VA-02 in November.

    I’m still kind of pissed about that one, too. Luria is one of the good ones.

  39. 39.

    TriassicSands

    @Steve in the ATL:

    Anti-choice is definitely a better description than pro-life, but pro-forced birth or forced birther may be even better.

    People who only care about fetuses and not children don’t deserve any title that is remotely positive.

  40. 40.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Steve in the ATL:

    Thank you! Why do even US liberals use the ‘pro life’ phrase?

    It is not only bad politics/bad framing, it also happens to be a lie.

    Forced birth, anti women’s health care, any number of frames are better than ‘pro life’.

    Oops. I see TriassicSands has said the same. Apologies.

  42. 42.

    Matt McIrvin

    I just say “pro/anti-abortion-rights”. I figure it’s best to tell it like it is; don’t act as if abortion is a dirty word that you need a euphemism for.

  43. 43.

    ColoradoGuy

    “Pro-life” is a focus-group-tested marketing phrase that goes back to Reagan. The GOP have been using advertising agencies since the Twenties (of the last century).

  44. 44.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Personally I would call them women killers, because that is what they are.

    I dread the spectacle, but sooner or later, in a red state, a woman is going to die because she was denied an abortion as a result of a still birth/miscarriage. This will be widely publicised as it should, and then the full weight of people’s disgust and revulsion at the barbarity of abortion denial will burst forth.

    Until that time, it will be a matter of agitation and organisation and small gains in such states, if it can be managed at all.

    Sadly, it will take a widely publicised ‘sympathetic’ death to really move the needle electorally in conservative states imo.
    It is terrible, but I think that is the only way that an electorate that doesn’t really like to think about such things will be moved.

  49. 49.

    EarthWindFire

    @Aussie Sheila: Right now, the official stance of the forced birthers is that abortions to treat miscarriages aren’t really abortions. We’re going to need a death like Savita Happanavar’s in Ireland for the red states to give a damn, probably several. Even then, I don’t know how it plays out with these whack jobs.

  50. 50.

    Elizabelle

    @Steeplejack:   Ah yes. The glory that is.  Joe Morrissey.

    His presence in the race ensured a large turnout for Jennifer McClellan, who won by like 84% or something.

    The 20 something guy behind me in the (50 minute long line, in 35 degree weather) to vote, to his friends:  “I had to show up to make sure a pervert is not running our government.”

    ===

    Very happy to hear of Rouse’s win.  You know those postcards made a difference.

    Appears seat is up again in 2024.  He should have an edge, and sounds like a personable and committed guy.  (Born and raised in the Tidewater area; former Green Bay Packer.)

  51. 51.

    MisterDancer

    @Aussie Sheila: a woman is going to die because she was denied an abortion as a result of a still birth/miscarriage. This will be widely publicised as it should

    Kay has been talking about this. I would not assume, based on her observations of reporting on the many horrific close-calls to-date (and my broad agreement therein), that said death will get the publicity you’d expect.

    American media is in a rough state in a lot of ways, even excluding outlets prone to downplaying any such situation. It’s also why you do hear people say terms like “pro-life”; that side has spent billions over decades to generate outright propaganda — just as some of their acolytes, like Murdoch, continue to impact your shores.

  52. 52.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud: Kind of like the way I refuse to call the Republican Party “the GOP” because that’s a cutesy affectionate nickname used by people who like them. Their formal name is polite enough. But I’m way out in left field here.

  54. 54.

    Betsy

     

    @EarthWindFire: I wonder  how it will play out, too.  There’s no telling.  Will the Catholic Church nominate the dead woman for sainthood, like they did about 20 years ago with a couple of European and a central American woman who died rather than abort their fetuses?

    It seems to me It was back during a particularly vociferous year or two in the forced-birth versus pro-choice battle. Done to make a point.

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