Virginia GOP ‘Panicking’ About ‘Clown Car’ Campaign for Governor: ‘Entire Ticket Is Going to Get Blown Out’

AP Photo/Allen G. Breed

Virginia Republicans are losing their enthusiasm for their gubernatorial nominee, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, with turmoil rocking her top campaign staff, her Democratic opponent Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) consistently walloping her in the polls, and fundraisers getting increasingly reluctant to cut checks. The situation is so dire that party faithful are “panicking” that Earle-Sears will not only lose, but also drag down the rest of the GOP ticket.

Both Earle-Sears and Spanberger coasted through their primaries after other challengers dropped out or failed to qualify for the ballot, but simply winning over their own partisan voters won’t win the race in November. Being able to appeal to independent and moderate voters is key in a state where former Vice President Kamala Harris, a Democrat, won by about six points but Gov. Glenn Youngkin is a Republican. (Youngkin is barred from running again by the state constitution.)

A poll in late May found Spanberger with a 17-point lead and identified key strengths for the Democrat that included “strong favorability ratings” and her reputation as a moderate Democrat who is willing to criticize fellow Democrats.

That poll noted tough numbers for Youngkin and President Donald Trump, which may be dragging Earle-Sears’s numbers down.

Just last week, Earle-Sears asked her campaign manager Will Archer to step down, shortly after the campaign’s political director Richard Wagner had taken his exit. Archer is a pastor in Virginia’s D.C. suburbs who had no prior political experience. Several of Earle-Sears’ fellow Virginia Republicans criticized — on the record — her decision to hire Archer in the first place. He will reportedly take on a different role for the campaign moving forward.

Spanberger is also trouncing Earle-Sears in fundraising, beating her 2-to-1 according to the latest report.

And now Virginia Republicans are worried Earle-Sears may hurt down-ballot races this November in their state, according to a report by Julia Manchester at The Hill, with one anonymous party operative calling her campaign “a disaster.”

Another anonymous Republican strategist bemoaned the”disappointing” results so far that illustrated the “lack of experience on Winsome’s campaign right now.”

“It’s easy to go win races in wave years, but competitive races take a competitive edge,” the strategist said. “And right now with Winsome’s team, you’re not getting any of that from her very well-paid consultants…They just don’t seem to have a fire under them. It’s more like a safe-seat race than one where you have to bulldoze your way across the commonwealth to add to the coalition to win a very purple state.”

Some of the most pointed criticism came from John Fredericks, a conservative talk show host who was the state chair for Trump’s presidential campaigns in 2016 and 2020, who bashed Earle-Sears’ campaign as “a dreadful operation.”

“This thing is a clown car she’s got going on,” said Fredericks. “And it’s frustrating everyone in Virginia.”

“The only thing that can save [Earle-Sears] is Glenn Youngkin,” he continued, hoping that the outgoing governor would “take this campaign over right now, lock, stock and barrel.”

“Other than that, she and the entire ticket is going to get blown out,” Fredericks predicted.

A growing worry was that Earle-Sears “could drag down the rest of the Republican ticket,” wrote Manchester. Democrats were polling ahead in other key statewide races but with a far closer margin than the gubernatorial contest, and there was chatter that it might be better to forfeit the governor’s race as a loss to salvage others. A particular concern was Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares (R), who “is seen by many Republicans in the state as the strongest component of the GOP ticket, given his incumbency status and what Republicans see as his talent on the campaign trail.”

Miyares, currently polling 9 points behind former Virginia state delegate Jay Jones (D), has $7 million cash on hand, more than Earle-Sears’ $4.5 million. (Both are dwarfed by Spanberger’s $15.2 million cash on hand.)

National GOP groups don’t seem to hold any more optimism for Earle-Sears’ chances in November. Politico’s Jonathan Martin had a brutal report Wednesday that Republicans were “panicking” over the Virginia governor’s race and “debating how much it can afford to spend on a losing proposition.”

“The convergence of paltry fundraising, weak polling and a candidate seen as incapable of fixing either has some in the RGA’s [Republican Governors Association] orbit unenthused, I’m told, about giving much more than the $500,000 the group has already contributed to Lt. Gov. Winsome Sears,” wrote Martin, highlighting how the problems seemed likely to only get worse for the Republican:

The money disparity is especially disheartening for Republicans because fundraising in these off-off year elections tends to be self-reinforcing, with donors and party committees curtailing their giving when they see candidates lagging. To borrow a phrase from Haley Barbour — a legendary fundraiser and former GOP governor himself — good gets better and bad gets worse, certainly when it comes to campaign dollars in such an environment.

Making the problem worse, Sears is reluctant to make fundraising or even glaringly obvious political phone calls, according to multiple Republicans familiar with her campaign. She’s not reached out to some of the most reliable donors in Virginia or to top GOP figures such as the Virginia-based Chris LaCivita, Trump’s campaign co-manager. And while Sears and Trump met privately earlier this year in the White House, the president has yet to embrace her candidacy, a non-endorsement that stems from her criticism of him between his two terms.

Virginia Republicans are feeling a “sense of dread,” wrote Martin, “alarmed their entire statewide ticket may lose and could deepen the party’s minority in the House of Delegates” and “prompting an earlier-than-usual political triage, in which the party races to determine who can be saved.”