We’re getting a better sense of where we can slot in the two candidates in the Democratic Party attorney general race, Shannon Taylor and Jay Jones.
Here’s where I concede, with everything else going on in the world, I’ve dropped the ball in terms of coverage of the June 17 primaries for the nominations for attorney general and lieutenant governor to others.
The LG race is like trying to make sense of the WWE Royal Rumble – there are just too many people in the ring to make any sense of what’s going on.
The AG race is a one-on-one affair, and the intraparty battle lines have been drawn, as is being evidenced this week with the effort of a group of 14 Virginia Democrats, led by 10th District Congressman Suhas Subramanyam and former Fifth District Congressman Tom Perriello, to try to corner Shannon Taylor, the Commonwealth’s attorney in Henrico County, into acknowledging the significant amount of money that her campaigns have received from Dominion, and to pledge to recuse herself from cases involving the utility if she were to be elected.
“This substantial financial support from a regulated utility company raises significant ethical questions that warrant immediate attention,” the group wrote in an open letter dated June 9, and posted on the website of Clean Virginia, a Charlottesville-based non-profit that launched a TV ad last week highlighting the $650,000 in donations from Dominion Energy to Taylor’s campaigns, a total that includes $100,000 for her campaign for the Democratic Party attorney general nomination.
To be clear, yes, this is politics at its core – the 14 Democrats involved in the open-letter effort have all endorsed Jay Jones, a former state delegate from Norfolk, for the AG nomination, and Jones has received $1.15 million in campaign money from the Clean Virginia Fund, a PAC affiliated with Clean Virginia, according to data from the Virginia Public Access Project.
I’ll try to be the umpire here – and my call is, it’s politics, but not dirty politics.
Voters have a right to know if there are potential conflicts, to be able to weigh them.
You have a right to know what Clean Virginia wants to do with its substantial backing of Jay Jones, and what Dominion Energy wants to do with the money it has thrown at Shannon Taylor.
“The Virginia Attorney General’s Office holds critical regulatory oversight responsibilities over Dominion Energy as a state-regulated utility. The Attorney General routinely appears in cases involving utility rate structures, environmental compliance, and consumer protection matters where Dominion Energy is the opposing party. This creates an inherent conflict of interest when a candidate for this office accepts contributions from the very entity they would be responsible for regulating and potentially prosecuting,” the Jones endorsers wrote in their June 9 open letter.
All fair.
Taylor issued a lengthy statement to The Richmond Times-Dispatch, which had asked her to address the push in the letter to recuse herself from cases involving Dominion Energy.
She didn’t touch that, but did use the opportunity to try to flip the narrative.
“Unlike Jay Jones, who’s never prosecuted a case and spent less than 10 months in the DC AGs office, I’ve spent 30 years prosecuting thousands of cases to protect Virginia families and hold fraudsters accountable,” Taylor said. I have the experience necessary to handle the complex regulatory issues facing Virginia families and businesses. And just like Attorney General Mark Herring and Governor Ralph Northam, Leader Don Scott, and Senate President Pro Tempore Louise Lucas, who have accepted contributions from Dominion Energy, I will always fight to do what is best for Virginia families.”
As I wrote above, the battle lines are drawn, just a few days out from the final day of voting in the AG primary, with the polls open and the votes being counted next Tuesday, June 17.
Jay Jones is the left-of-center candidate, and Shannon Taylor is the establishment Democrat candidate.
Vote accordingly.
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Chris Graham
