What Went Down During The 2021 Elections

At the end of such a long and intense campaign season for both Virginia gubernatorial candidates, what were each of their final pitches to voters before polls opened on Election Day?

At his final rally on Monday night, Youngkin emphasized his positions on schools and his contrasts with McAuliffe.

“This is our moment, where we stand up for our children, for our grandchildren, for our nieces, for our nephews, for our neighbors, and we decide that we in fact are going to be in charge of our children’s education,” Youngkin said to cheers. “In order to do this, we have to, we have to break the power out of Richmond. We have to have a moment where power shifts away from the marble halls in Richmond to the kitchen tables around Virginia, to the kitchen tables that are bound together by freedom and liberty.”

Youngkin later portrayed his opponent as trying to restrict people’s liberties.

“Friends, this is a moment where tomorrow we’re gonna see such clear distinctions on the ballot; on one side is Terry McAuliffe, and Terry McAuliffe, we know he wants to put government between parents and our children … Terry McAuliffe thinks that these rights are not absolute. Well, let me tell you: these rights and our Bill of Rights are absolute.”

During his own final rally, McAuliffe continued to tie Youngkin to Trump — a theme McAuliffe has used throughout his campaign.

“Guess how Glenn Youngkin is finishing his campaign? He is doing an event with Donald Trump here in Virginia. I’m here with you. And they’ve got Trump over there,” McAuliffe said.

McAuliffe was referring to a phone rally Trump held for Youngkin the same evening. Youngkin did not participate directly in the phone rally with Trump, and it was not coordinated by Youngkin’s campaign.

Later, McAuliffe emphasized how many times Youngkin has received Trump’s endorsement.

But McAuliffe also spent time during the rally talking about his record when he served as Virginia’s governor from 2014 to 2018.

“In my low-key way, I went in and I replaced the Board of Health, and every single women’s reproductive clinic stayed open here in the commonwealth of Virginia. But had you not worked your heart out [to elect me]? There would not be one women’s clinic opened today,” McAuliffe said.

The preliminary exit poll also suggests that the 2021 electorate voted close to even in the 2020 presidential race, even though we know Biden won Virginia by 10 points last November. There are caveats here, however, in that people aren’t always great at recalling who they voted for in past elections and that, again, these are preliminary exit polls and the numbers could change. Still, we’ve long expected the electorate in Virginia to be somewhat more GOP-friendly than in 2020. With a Democratic president in office, Republicans are frustrated and more motivated to cast a ballot, just as Democrats were during the Trump years. And with Biden’s approval rating nationally in the mid-to-low 40s, that may have provided an extra dollop of energy on the right and depressed turnout on the left, too.

The preliminary exit polls suggest almost three in four voters where white, while a little over one in four were members of racial and ethnic minority groups, which points to a Virginia electorate that is somewhat whiter than the 2020 electorate (although note that exit polls have tended to overstate how diverse the electorate is). We know white voters are more Republican-leaning, so this is good news for Youngkin, and it suggests that one of the worries Democrats had coming into this election — lower turnout among Black voters — may have come to pass.