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Virginia Republican gubernatorial nominee Glenn Youngkin speaks during his election night party at a hotel in Chantilly, Virginia, U.S., November 3, 2021.
GOP wins Virginia gubernatorial race. In a stunning upset, Republican Glenn Youngkin won Virginia's highly-anticipated governor's race. Youngkin beat Democrat former Gov. Terry McAuliffe by two points, a wider-than-expected margin. The result — in a purple state that President Joe Biden bagged by a comfortable 10 percent a year ago — is very bad news for Democrats ahead of the 2022 midterms. Biden didn't get the boost he was hoping for to turn the tide on his poor approval rating and his domestic political agenda, stalled by deep divisions within the party over two landmark infrastructure and social spending bills. What's more, McAuliffe underperformed with suburban voters and independents — crucial to Biden's 2020 victory and whom Democrats must woo to keep control of Congress a year from now. Republicans now gain momentum because winning back suburbanites and independents who hate Donald Trump improves their (already good) odds for the midterms. More broadly, the outcome in Virginia also shows the GOP a new electoral college pathway to win the presidential race in 2024... as long as Trump himself isn't on the ballot.