Rhodes Cook: THE VIRGINIA GUBERNATORIAL ELECTION – CLUES FROM THE PAST
It is often said that the past is prologue. In that regard, this year’s gubernatorial candidates in Virginia–Democrat Creigh Deeds and Republican Bob McDonnell–share a bit of common history. They ran against each other for state attorney general in 2005, a race that ended as one of the closest statewide elections in Virginia history. Following a recount, McDonnell emerged the winner by a margin of just 360 votes out of nearly 2 million cast.
The question is how much that first, razor-close Deeds-McDonnell race can serve as a road map for their rematch this year. Four years ago, they were part of the “under card,” overshadowed by the much higher profile race for governor. Since then, Virginia politics has been turned on its head, with a succession of Democratic victories that has arguably transformed the state from bright red to at least the color purple.
Yet their first contest for attorney general highlighted the generic strength of each party that to a large degree still holds true today. Of the state’s 11 congressional districts, McDonnell carried eight, Deeds only three. But the election ended in a virtual tie because McDonnell’s strength geographically was broad but not particularly deep, while Deeds’ support was concentrated in a small number of places where Democrats dominate.
McDonnell ran best in 2005 in the 7th Congressional District, which extends from Richmond northwest to the Blue Ridge Mountains. The district is currently represented in Congress by a rising star in the national Republican Party, Eric Cantor, and in 2005 it gave McDonnell 58 percent of the vote. In no other district did McDonnell win more than 56 percent.
Meanwhile, Deeds garnered fully two-thirds of the vote in both the black-majority 3rd Congressional District in southeast Virginia’s Tidewater and the Northern Virginia 8th. The latter is a liberal suburban enclave along the Potomac River that is represented by Democrat Jim Moran (the older brother of one of Deeds’ unsuccessful Democratic rivals this year, Brian Moran).
To this day, the two districts form the basic building block for statewide Democratic victories. In 2005, Deeds won the pair by a combined plurality of more than 110,000 votes. That, plus his 11,000-vote edge in Northern Virginia’s 11th District, which includes much of suburban Fairfax County, produced what was essentially a dead heat with McDonnell.