Power & Market

National Review Gets Virginia Wrong

National Review Gets Virginia Wrong

National Review seems to think the recent election in Virginia was about Trump, when in fact it was entirely about demographics. Virginia is no longer a red state, and will become increasingly deeper blue in the decades ahead. This is why Romney lost in 2012, why Trump lost in 2016, why Ed Gillespie lost this week, and why future Ed Gillespies will lose statewide elections in the Old Dominion for the foreseeable future. Fidelity to Trumpism, or lack thereof, was not Gillespie’s downfall. Nor was his milquetoast brand of Chamber of Commerce Republicanism, which nonetheless was sufficient to have him branded a race baiter in an opposition ad.

Just 20 years ago the northern Virginia suburbs were still the “conservative” part of the Beltway. Alexandria was always blue, but Arlington County had a mix that included some conservatives and leftover Reagan administration types. Fairfax and Loudoun counties, faraway at the time, were only somewhat suburban and largely rural. To say a few decades of growth changed the landscape would be a gross understatement, in fact perhaps no other part of the US has changed so rapidly. Today the entire region is one of the richest in the US, and in keeping with the times it became more leftwing as it became more wealthy. This would be true even if the direct source of that wealth was not the federal government.

Northern Virginia is also full of immigrants from Central America, South America, and Asia, many of whom are decidedly less affluent than their lawyer and lobbyist neighbors. In 2012 my own former city of Falls Church held Peruvian elections in a local high school gym, providing a form of absentee voting I assume was respected by that country’s officials (although I don’t know how ballots were transported back, or whether they were electronic). Immigrants in the NoVa suburbs benefit from the bustling micro-economy created by federal largesse, but by and large don’t work directly in “the business.” Many of the most recent arrivals live in overcrowded shared housing, causing uncomfortable situations for local zoning boards who want to enforce occupancy rules but don’t want to appear racist or insensitive. And with even tiny houses from the 1940s selling for $600 or $700 thousand, where exactly are immigrants supposed to live?

It’s an uncomfortable juxtaposition of wealth and relative poverty, with the two existing in proximity normally seen in big cities rather than suburban areas. Great Falls and McLean might as well be Beverly Hills. And while immigrants and their children may have little in common with the patent attorney living just a mile or two away, in the vast majority of cases both lean heavily Democrat. Immigrant non-citizens may not be able to vote, but their children certainly will. 

If you want to understand northern Virginia in a nutshell, look no further than the cluttered, heavily trafficked hellscape known as Tyson’s Corner. This is what happens when artificial growth, fueled by Uncle Sam and the Fed, materializes in the form of an ersatz town. It is malinvestment in visible physical form.

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So sorry National Review, winning elections in Virginia is not about explaining Reagan nostalgia or tax reform. It’s about numbers. Terry McAuliffe is essentially the Governor of northern Virginia (with a nod to the Tidewater area and core Richmond; throw in lefty Charlottesville for good measure). He doesn’t pretend otherwise, and didn’t campaign otherwise. He doesn’t need the rest of the state, and neither will his Democratic successors.

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