What Went Down During The 2021 Elections

I’d keep in mind that if results reported so far look slightly better for Youngkin, the pre-election polls also looked slightly better for him, as did the exit poll. So while it’s anybody’s race and all of these indicators are tenuous, they do tend to point in the same direction.

McAuliffe also left office when Trump was in office, which benefited the popularity of all kinds of Democrats. I think even de Blasio was popular in 2017.

I also sort of never understood why McAuliffe was terribly popular in the first place, since political operative/former Democratic National Committee chair typically isn’t a popular item to have on a résumé! But Virginia is a weird state … err … commonwealth.