From the Grand Ballroom of the Richmond Marriott, the three statewide winners each thanked their supporters, offered best wishes to their opponents, and promised to work tirelessly to return Virginia to a healthy economic condition. In his comments, Bolling was quick to note, “without raising taxes.”
Even so, McDonnell and the new Republican leadership will come to office with a troubled economy and a transportation funding system that has eluded the best attempts of other governors to fix.
Still, that is a problem for the day after Election Day. In the interim, the Republican Party of Virginia is entitled to enjoy the large margins of their victory.
Often cited as a battleground county, Loudoun followed the statewide trend, providing strong support to the Republican ticket and partly indicating that the battle was lost to the Democrats in 2009. With 70 of 71 precincts reporting, McDonnell won Loudoun County with 61.07 percent (39,338 votes). Bolling won 58.77 percent of with 37,523 votes. Cuccinelli won 59.17 percent with 26,710 votes.
A McDonnell victory had been predicted by nearly every published poll over the course of the campaign, however, the strength of the final results—particularly in a Loudoun County still fresh from providing a victory to President Barack Obama—may have surprised even Republican strategists.
The Democratic Party candidate for Governor, State Senator Creigh Deeds, gave his concession speech, congratulating his opponent and saying, “I wish tonight’s results were different. But now is not the time for bitterness, or retreat into our partisan corners—it’s time to overcome that disappointment with our determination to build a better Virginia, together.“
Similar statements were made by Democratic candidate for Lt. Governor Jody Wagner and Attorney General candidate Steve Shannon.
Deeds and McDonnell traded barbs over the course of the campaign, with Deeds being strongly criticized by many for his negative tone. The large margin of victory by McDonnell and the campaign tactics by the Deeds camp was widely blamed for other Democratic losses.
“It’s like a reverse-coattail,” said one Republican voter.
The size of the victory is certainly significant and it provided a strong “coat-tail” effect to those Republican candidates for the House of Delegates. No Democratic candidate for the House of Delegates was elected from Loudoun County, with incumbents David Poisson and Chuck Caputo unseated by their Republican challengers.
Watching the election returns at the Loudoun Government Center, incumbent Delegate Joe May stated, “I give a lot of the credit to Glen Caroline.” Caroline is the Chairman of the The Loudoun County Republican Committee (LCRC).
The LCRC released a statement on the results of the 2009 election, with a message from Chairman Caroline, who said, “Collectively the candidates ran excellent, issue-oriented campaigns, and combined with our grassroots efforts here in Loudoun, this sweep was a direct result of superior messaging by our candidates and a superior ground game by our supporters across the county."
Caroline continued by saying, “It is clear that today's result is an unmistakable sign that the promise of 'hope and change' pledged by President Obama isn't resonating with voters in Virginia and Loudoun County.”
On the day after the 2009 elections, there will doubtless be pundits attempting to categorize or explain away the Virginia elections. McDonnell and Bolling ran an extremely disciplined moderate campaign focusing on the economy and transportation. While some will claim that this return to moderate Republican strategy proved to be the winning combination for Republicans in Virginia, others will point to the much more socially conservative candidacy of Ken Cuccinelli and several successful candidates for the House of Delegates.
What does appear to be certain is that the lessened strength of the Republican Party in the wake of an Obama victory, appears to be a falsehood. Shortly after the 2008 Democratic victory in Virginia, some pundits called it the “death of the Republican Party.”
The results of the 2009 election also saw the continuation of the “Virginia curse,” the Commonwealth’s history of electing a governor of the opposite party of the sitting president elected in the prior year. This unique Virginia tradition has continued in every election cycle since 1976.
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Ken Cuccenelli, to his credit, softened his rhetoric and melded well with the ticket. He actually never appeared to be at odds with it. This team effort has even impressed many of Cuccenelli's former critics.
Ken, considering that you've been very capable of joining and helping support the "team" effort, I'm happy that you bring your expertise to this ticket.
John, this was never a surprise. We busted our humps EVERYDAY for the past year to bring this about.
We were blessed with political winds , I will concede. We owe the voters who made it happen. But half of the result was inevitably driven by Chairman Caroline and the LCRC's new outlook to be more than attendees or a club. Every member is an activist with expectations to advance the Party's Creed. With similar drives by the Chairs in Fairfax (Thank you Chr. Bedell!!) and Prince William County, the Northern Virginia block is solidly RED for the next year. We'll see where that leads us into November, 2010 and beyond.
The FCRC, and the LCRC were uniquely prepared to adapt to this unique opportunity and make it a positive turn.
(This author is 72 HR Chair for the LCRC)