One narrative that I’m hearing from pundits today – Democrats won because Republicans didn’t bother voting, out of frustration with Trump – it’s wrong, at least in Virginia.
In last year’s gubernatorial election, there were 3,433,340 votes cast statewide.
In the 2026 voting cycle that concluded on Tuesday: 3,551,786.
That’s 118,446 more – a 3.4 percent increase.
Also, relative to the 2022 midterms: 3,021,956 votes were cast in the 2022 cycle in Virginia; the 2026 turnout was up 411,384 over 2022, 12.0 percent.
If Democrats won because a lot of Republicans skipped out, we somehow found a helluva lot of people who didn’t vote Democrat and got them to come out to vote this cycle.
No.
What we saw in Virginia was, the same frustrations that motivated Rs to shift to Ds from 2024 to 2025 were still being expressed in 2026.
Here’s the shift from 2024 to 2026
2024: Kamala Harris share of presidential vote
2025: Abigail Spanberger share of gubernatorial vote
2026: congressional candidate share of vote
Net gain: 2024-2026
- First: 46.7% D/2024, 51.2% D/2025, 51.0% D 2026 – net gain: +4.3%
- Second: 49.1% D/2024, 53.7% D/2025, 53.0%/2026 – net gain: +3.9%
- Third: 66.4% D/2024, 71.9% D/2025, 72.6% D/2026 – net gain: +6.2%
- Fourth: 65.4% D/2024, 70.6% D/2025, 72.2% D/2026 – net gain: +6.8%
- Fifth: 43.2% D/2024, 46.3% D/2025, 48.0% D/2026 – net gain: +4.8%
- Sixth: 37.3% D/2024, 41.6% D/2025, 44.3% D/2026 – net gain: +7.0%
- Seventh: 50.2% D/2024, 57.6% D/2025, 59.7% D/2026 – net gain: +9.5%
- Eighth: 73.0% D/2024, 80.1% D/2025, 79.3% D/2026 – net gain: +6.3%
- Ninth: 27.5% D/2024, 31.7% D/2025, 33.8% D/2026 – net gain: +6.3%
- Tenth: 52.7% D/2024, 60.1% D/2025, 60.8% D/2026 – net gain: +8.1%
- Eleventh: 65.2% D/2024, 73.5% D/2025, 73.7% D/2026 – net gain: +8.2%
Analysis
Virginia is the rare state with a statewide election in between a presidential and a midterm, but as such, we have the ability to track voter trends from year to year.
The Virginia numbers from 2024 to 2025 and then 2025 to 2026 make clear: at least here, our dissatisfaction with Trump came early on into Trump 2.0.
I would postulate that, elsewhere, perhaps what we saw last night was voters across the country using their votes in 2026 to express their dissatisfaction with Trump because that was their first opportunity to do so.
I would also offer that, Trump/MAGA could have tried to figure out what happened in Virginia and adjusted course to try to prevent last night from happening, and chose instead to double, triple, quadruple and et cetera down on what got their hands slapped in Virginia in 2025.
The lowest point of Trump 2.0 came after the Virginia debacle, if you remember – the winter months in Minnesota, shooting people in the streets protesting ICE, that happened after our early warning signs from Virginia.
I think we can expect a similar level of political stubbornness from that side going forward, which would foretell another moment of reckoning for Trump and his remaining hangers-on.
Share
Chris Graham
