The Virginia legislature stuck it to Ralph Northam with his special session on gun control. This is a good outcome, but one that won’t survive if the Dems gain control of the legislature, as they are moving to do unless the Virginia GOP gets its act together. The demographic trends in Virginia are challenging: the federal government doesn’t get smaller, and Virginia has been flooded with new federal workers who will vote for Dems. I understand that the GOP is getting shaky even in the tidewater areas.
Virginia is one of the most important states for us, because NRA’s ability to recruit passionate people depends on there being an active and healthy gun culture in Virginia. Even if you don’t love NRA right now, any effective lobbying organization is either going to locate in DC, Maryland or Virginia. DC and Maryland are already lost.
There is going to be a Democrat landslide in the House of Delegates. Not sure about the Senate – but I doubt the Republicans can keep that as well.
I suspect Virginia goes to the left of Maryland in the next couple of years. Its going to be brutal. And 50,000 new Amazon employees won’t help the situation in N. Virginia.
Do you live in Virginia? You have no confidence in the State GOP holding the House of Delegates?
Along side the gun issue, if the Democrats take over Virginia with the State Legislature, I can’t wait to see how massive the tax increases are, as well as the spikes in cost of living.
Truly disgusting with what has happened to that State. Starting in the late 1990’s, a lot of Maryland, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts transplants began moving there. That’s ultimately what made the State purple by 2004. You obviously see what’s happening today. Leftwingers move into the low-tax, low cost of living, Republican States and proceed to destroy them with their disgusting voting habits of Democrats Galore.
The US HOR just voted on an H1B Visa Bill that would grant 300,000 H1B Visas to Indian Immigrant Workers. I guarantee you that a significant chunk of that is for Amazon. BTW, Virginia will see a nice influx of California Silicon-Valley Leftwing filth moving in too, courtesy of Amazon of course.
Amazon is a Seattle company, not a valley company. So Seattle leftwing filfth.
Not to worry, I’m sure the republican-controlled senate will shoot down the visa bill, and if not then our republican president will veto it.
Joe, I’ve lived here for 25 years. My wife is from here.
Things started going downhill with Clinton. They got a lot worse with AOL and the emergence of Nova as a competitor to Silicon Valley.
Then they went into overdrive post 9/11 when all the Dot.Bombs remade themselves into Cyber Defense Companies. Add to that the generational gap and the overall brain dead nature of older Republicans unwilling to adopt. And then there is George Makaka Allen. He deserves, single handidly, as much blame as anyone. Calling the guy Makaka was bad enough. But then when he ran again to recapture the seat – and the idiot Virginia GOP allowed him to secure the nomination – I personally witnesses dozens of GOP voters here in my formerly solid Republican part of NOVA leave the party for good.
Its a lost cause.
I have no faith in the Republicans holding the Senate either.
So it sounds as if the Virginia Republican Party is just a child of the DC GOP Establishment Country Club Republicans.
They don’t care about the State, and/or whether or not they retain their Legislative Majorities. They exist to take in the campaign funds to feather their nests…….sad, really.
I know that Virginia started turning purple in the 90s. Chuck Robb, a Leftist Liberal Democrat, got elected as a US Senator in 1988, that was actually the first warning sign.
I didn’t know that the Tech Industry started ballooning in NOVA in the mid-1990s though, so you opened my eyes to that, big time. It must also be the reason that so much leftwing trash from the Urban Northeast States moved into your State.
Yep. The internet basically started here. First the Pentagon. Then America Online.
And that, plus Bill and Hillary, spelled doom.
The NRA / NRA-ILA is rather meaningless and impotent in Virginia politics. They’re almost totally ineffectual at anything other than being a “me too†voice for gun rights at the state level. UNLESS, it’s to undercut VCDL with a weaker, compromise bill.
They are notorious for that behavior, particularly back in the 2001-2006 time frame on numerous pieces of legislation.
VCDL.org holds the state assembly and local governments too account. VCDL shows tangible, trackable results; success and failure every year. VCDL ( the PAC I think ) does not hide their candidate evaluation criteria, nor the responses or lack thereof. More importantly, they don’t like about candidate responses or lack thereof like the NRA-ILA – Jim Webb vs. George Allen for US Senate.
Guaranteed, GOP saw circling “electoral great white shark fins†in the form of VCDL members and gun owners fed up with being scapegoated for the actions of gun thugs.
if the GOP wants to stay in control in the general assembly in Virginia, they’d better step up with a slate of pro-gun bills for the next session and do it fast.
The best thing gun owners in Virginia can do is
join VCDL or renew their membership
ask the leadership team how they can help
There are a lot of pro-gun folks in these foundations, organizations and lobbying firms in and around DC, even some dems. it’s the outreach to these people that is the challenge, because they are the newbies, and can go a long way to evangelizing the shooting community.
The Virginia Shooting Sports Association (NRA’s state association) and NRA-ILA were very active getting gun owners to turn out at pre-session Townhalls/training sessions and then at the session on Tuesday. There was a line around the Pocohantas building to get in. The townhalls were well attended. I know that the Virginia Beach ILA townhall was packed and I presume the Fredericksburg and Southwest Virginia ones were too (Southwest Virginia especially given what they did to Secretary of Public Safety Brian Moran when he was there schilling for the Governor). The one thing that concerns me is the other side had a large turnout too, and it wasn’t astroturf people bused in from out of state. They are just as pissed at what happened as gun folks are happy. This isn’t over. If gun onwers don’t turn out in November, we’re done. Stick a fork in us because as VSSA Life-member and Second Amendment attorney Steve Halbrook is fond of saying, Virginia will be “Californicated” overnight.
Can you summarize the Demographics of both sides? Sadly, that’s the key to knowing what’s up.
“The one thing that concerns me is the other side had a large turnout too, and it wasn’t astroturf people bused in from out of state. They are just as pissed at what happened as gun folks are happy”.
Sounds like if the Democrats take over both Chambers of the VA Legislature, that State is gonna get into an ugly situation.
Those are the Northeast Liberal Urbanite Democrat Goose-Steppers that moved into Virginia from places like NJ, CT, MA, and MD. They moved in to escape the cesspools they created previously to then recreate them in the Old Dominion.
If gunowners are dumb enough to sit out 2019, then they all deserve the f***ing that they’re gonna get.
I lived in NOVA in the early 2000s/late 1990s. At that time, “suburbia” with soccer moms, transplants and purple to blue voting habits extended out to Manassas. Loudon County and further was still rural, populated with native Virginians, and pretty conservative. Additionally, circa 2000 it was still acceptable for moderate suburban types in the outer rings of DC’s orbit to hold certain policy views.
In the last 15 years, there has been a LOT of growth in NOVA. The population in Fairfax county is up 150k, but more importantly, Loudon county doubled from 175k to 400k. Loudon is no longer rural and conservative. The other surrounding counties are in the same boat. People now commute to DC from Fredericksburg!
Additionally Fairfax County has seen some big changes. There have been a lot of immigrants, especially Hispanics and Asians, and the GOP was ineffective at reaching out to those communities. The poverty rate has increased somewhat with more of the population on government assistance. The Overton window for policy has shifted for upple middle class college educated suburbanites dramatically. Pretty moderate positions on a wide variety of topics will now get your kids shunned at school and get you disinvited from BBQs and cocktail parties.
Finally, urban Richmond and parts of Hampton Roads remain Democrat bastions. They aren’t enough to politically dominate the state but when combined with NOVA probably are (unless gerrymandered, which the courts ruled against).
Between the leftward lurch of the Fairfax population and the transplants swamping rural communities NOVA can now probably drive the train poitically.
Thanks Reynolds v Sims!
The dems floated a pretty extreme AWB with no grandfathering. They decided to skip registration and go for the brass ring. It failed by a few votes along party lines.
When the GOP loses control of the legislature due to the redistricting ruling and demographics I suspect VA will have a heck of a fight against a draconian AWB.
Funny that you bring up the “Redistricting Issue”. In the 1990s, the Virginia Democrat Party controlled the State House of Delegates and lobbied Jim Gilmore, the Republican Governor from 1998-2002, to help them create ‘Minority-Majority’ Districts.
Fast-forward to 2019, and you have Leftwing Democrat Activist Judges striking down the Racial-Gerrymandering that their party fought for in the 1990s.
Scumbags galore, aren’t they? The only hope that the Virginia GOP has is for that the higher turnout they had in the 2019 primaries shows up for the General Elections. The Democrats in the State Legislature actually helped to scuttle Northam’s proposed tax hikes these past couple of years.
Right. I’m sure Joe!!! will show up in battle armor ready to help Countertop take the state back.
Wait for the DOT.BEVERAGE to burst.