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“A Perfect Storm”: A No-B.S. Read of What Really Happened in Virginia

Yes, the political cudgel of Critical Race Theory helped Glenn Youngkin defeat The Macker. But despite the media’s desire to have a TV-friendly narrative explain it all, the behind-the-ballot-curtain reality is more complex—and relevant for ’22… and ’24.

Glenn Youngkin
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Peter Hamby
November 7, 2021

Democrats outside Virginia apparently know something that Democrats inside Virginia don’t. Even before the networks had called Tuesday’s election, in which Republicans reclaimed all three statewide offices and the House of Delegates in a state that most political savants had assumed was permanently blue, a consensus explanation had already taken hold on the left. It was racism, of course.