(Richmond) Barack Obama is campaigning in Virginia on Saturday for a particularly close local election, seen as a national test of Joe Biden’s popularity as he fiercely negotiates a massive investment plan with Congress.
The former president, who remains the most popular Democrat in the United States five years after leaving the White House, comes to support Democrat Terry McAuliffe, 64,, candidate for governor of Virginia, whom he previously held of 2014 to 2018.
Mr McAuliffe, a former Democratic Party chairman, is neck-and-neck with pro-Trump Republican Glenn Youngkin, 54, ahead of the Nov. 2 poll, and his side fears a disaffection among Democratic voters.
Before Mr. Obama, who is due to deliver an afternoon address at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, in the conservative south of the state, First Lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and one of the Rising Democratic Party star Stacey Abrams have traveled to Virginia to campaign for Mr McAuliffe. The American president himself is expected there next week.
Joe Biden won Virginia 10 points clear in 2020, and Republicans haven’t won an election in that state since 2009. But the Democratic nominee’s lead has narrowed over the weeks, and his lead in the polls is now reduced to the margin of error.
A victory for Mr McAuliffe would give momentum to the massive investment program the left wing of the Democratic Party is seeking to push through Congress. Failure could prompt more caution from the moderate wing of the party, which is still reluctant to approve some $ 3 trillion in spending.
Mr. Obama hopes to galvanize African-American voters, a key electorate in this southern state, especially in the Richmond area, where one of the most important symbols of the country’s slave past, the statue of Confederate General Robert Lee, n ‘was debunked only last month.
“I saw Terry firmly defend the values to which we are all attached: the protection of the right to vote for every citizen, the fight against climate change, and the defense of the right to abortion,” Obama noted in a spot. televised before his arrival.
Mr. McAuliffe presented the ballot as a referendum against Donald Trump.
“This is the most important poll of 2021,” he said in an election leaflet sent to voters on Saturday. “If Democrats vote in as large numbers as in 2020, we will win. But if not, we’ll lose – and there we can say goodbye to all of Virginia’s progress and hello to the resurgence of Trumpism in our country. ”
Mr Youngkin has focused on schools, campaigning against the mandatory mask hated by Donald Trump voters, but he has carefully avoided supporting the former president’s claims that the election has left him been stolen.
Mr. Trump did not visit Virginia, but he virtually joined a pro-Youngkin campaign rally on Oct. 13 that included his former adviser Steve Bannon.