Spanberger versus Earle-Sears: What to Know About the Virginia Governor Race

Virginia holds its gubernatorial election one year after the U.S. presidential election, and the president’s standing affects that party’s nominee.

Abigail Spanberger, Democratic candidate for Virginia’s Seventh District in the U.S. House of Representatives, speaks at an election eve rally at John R. Tucker High School in Richmond, Va., Nov. 5, 2018. Win McNamee/Getty Images

WASHINGTON—Virginia will hold an election on Nov. 4 to choose its 75th governor. The incumbent, Glenn Youngkin, is ineligible for reelection. It is one of two open-seat gubernatorial elections this year, the other being in New Jersey.

Virginia’s election has always been unique, as it occurs one year after the quadrennial U.S. presidential election. The incumbent president’s popularity always affects his party’s reputation, which makes it a factor in the gubernatorial race. Moreover, because of Virginia’s proximity to Washington, D.C., and heavy population of federal workers, contractors, and military personnel, the state of national politics has an outsized effect on Virginia voters. Thus, the race is often a way to gauge voters’ satisfaction with the presidential administration.

This year, for the first time, two women are the major party nominees, meaning the winner will become the first female governor of Virginia. Four years ago, Youngkin as a political novice won the race against former Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D-Va.) based on promises about education policy and dissatisfaction with President Joe Biden. This year, similar issues are atop voters’ minds and candidates’ arguments to win.

Below are key details about the election, the candidates, and the issues.

Winsome Earle-Sears

Earle-Sears (R), 61, is the 42nd lieutenant governor of Virginia, elected in 2021 alongside Youngkin, and is the Republican nominee. She is the first woman to have occupied that post. If elected, she would make history as the first black woman elected to serve as the governor of any U.S. state.

Earle-Sears was born in Jamaica and immigrated to the United States in 1970 at age 6. She was raised in The Bronx borough of New York City, and after school, enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps, where she served as an electrician from 1983 to 1986. Later, she moved to Virginia and attended several of its universities.

Her political career began in 2001, when in an upset she was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates against a 20-year incumbent, representing the 90th District that covers Norfolk and Virginia Beach. At the time, she became the first naturalized U.S. citizen member in the history of the body, which had existed since 1776 when Virginia declared independence during the American Revolution.

Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears speaks to supporters during a primary night rally at the Hippodrome Theater in Richmond, Va., on June 17, 2025. Win McNamee/Getty Images

She served only one term, however, and ran for the U.S. House of Representatives from Virginia’s Third District in 2004 but lost. Earle-Sears’s next election came in 2021, when she was elected alongside Youngkin and state Attorney General Jason Miyares (R), during a year when Republicans made a clean sweep of Virginia’s top three statewide offices.

Earle-Sears won the Republican nomination unopposed after two opponents failed to garner enough signatures from voters to mount campaigns against her. She is running on the Youngkin administration’s record, as well as promises to cut the cost of living, end the state’s “car tax,” and defend the state’s “right-to-work” law that prevents unionization.

“[I] helped Governor Youngkin lower taxes and improve education,” said Earle-Sears in her principal campaign advertisement video.

Most polling shows that Earle-Sears is trailing former Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.), the Democratic nominee. A recent poll by Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) showed her 12 percentage points behind Spanberger, at just 37 percent support.

Abigail Spanberger

Spanberger, 45, served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2019 to 2025, representing Virginia’s Seventh District, which covers exurban areas southeast of Washington, D.C. During the 2018 congressional election, when Democrats won a large majority in the House of Representatives, she unseated then-Rep. Dave Brat (R-Va.), who became famous for unseating House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R) in 2014.

After graduating from the University of Virginia, Spanberger was a federal law enforcement officer for the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, with the rank of postal inspector. Later, she joined the CIA as an “operations officer” from 2006 to 2014. Spanberger announced her candidacy for the Seventh District in 2017 and won the primary contest for the 2018 election with 73 percent of the vote.

In Congress, Spanberger served on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and with her experience on national security matters was vocal on those issues. She also developed a reputation for bipartisanship and was deemed to be among the top 10 most bipartisan members of Congress by the Lugar Center of Georgetown University.

Spanberger began her campaign for governor in 2023, which cleared the Democratic field of likely challengers. Rather than remain in Congress by running in 2024, Spanberger announced that she would retire, focusing full-time on the gubernatorial race. She was nominated without opposition in the Democratic Party’s primary contest.

Spanberger is running on conventional themes observed in Democratic politics nationwide: She promises to increase the number of teachers in public schools, defend access to abortion services, and expand childcare subsidies. However, she has declined to support repealing the state’s right-to-work law—bucking unions, who are traditionally a decisive constituency for Democrats. She recently released an economic plan as well.

Spanberger has also emphasized the defense of federal workers as a theme of her campaign. The Trump administration’s efforts to reduce the size of the federal workforce have been opposed by most Democrats in the area, many of them federal workers or contractors.

In terms of education, she said in her campaign advertisement: “I'll work to lower costs and make sure our schools prepare all our kids.”

Spanberger’s lead over Earl-Sears varies, but she is consistently ranked ahead. The VCU poll shows her with 49 percent support. The Cook Political Report characterizes the race as “Lean Democratic,” and most predictors expect her to win.