Final Virginia Calls: Sears Gets Smoked, Miyares Completes Stunning Comeback, Democrats Reach 60 in House of Delegates
Well. We’ve reached the end ladies and gentlemen. The 2025 cycle in Virginia will reach its completion tomorrow night when the polls close and a new Governor will be elected.
Unlike last time around, the race for governor will not be close. I’ve had this race rated as safe since late August, and it’s not getting changed. Abigail Spanberger will be the next Governor of Virginia, hands down. If she does not win tomorrow, that will be a bigger miracle than when Jesus came back to life at this point. I’m projecting anywhere between a 9-12 point victory for Spanberger tomorrow, with the margin that Ralph Northam beat Ed Gillespie by in 2017 being the bare minimum I think Spanberger will win by at this point.
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Looking at the race for Lieutenant Governor, I did go back and forth a little bit on whether to shift that race to Likely Democratic. Democratic nominee State Sen. Ghazala Hashmi has ran a relatively underwhelming campaign compared to GOP nominee John Reid, but her margin in polls has barely slipped below 6-7 points in best case scenarios for Reid on average.
It’s entirely possible that Hashmi disappoints relative to Spanberger’s margin, but I don’t think she’s any less certain of a victory. So I’m keeping the LG race at Safe D too. In terms of margin, I think Hashmi has the biggest variance. She could underperform Spanberger by I think as much as five-to-six points or basically run right up beside her. We’ll see when polls close tomorrow.
You already know where I’m going with the AG race if you read the title. I am officially moving the AG race from Toss-up to Lean Republican. I don’t do tilts, so none of that nonsense here. This is the prediction statewide that has the most potential to be wrong on my end. I am ok with that. While polling from trustworthy pollsters has shown both Jason Miyares and Jay Jones up in the final days, I’m sticking my horse with Miyares.
It is going to be close. That I have no doubt of. And we very well could have a 2013 situation here why Jones pulls out by less than 10,000 votes like Mark Herring did that year. But Miyares still has the most momentum on his side in my opinion. Not only do I think he’s convinced a not small number of Spanberger/Hashmi voters to vote for him, I think there are enough voters who will leave the AG ballot blank to combine with the swing voters to give Miyares the win. It will be narrow, potentially by less than a point- but I do think Jason Miyares survives tomorrow, giving Republicans an inkling of hope when the time comes for 2029.
Democrats to Flip Nine House Seats, Reach 60 Seats for First Time Since 1988
Yup, I’m predicting Democrats will reach 60 seats. That alone will not be a surprise. Many outlets, analysts and hot-takes men will have the Democrats anywhere from around 59-62 seats it seems headed into tomorrow. I’m admittedly going to be on the low end of that side, and with a different combination than most will have. Let me explain myself though.
First, let me remind you of the four current GOP held seats I already had flipping before going into the final decisions I made on the tossups.
HD-57, David Owen (I-R): Safe Democratic
HD-71, Amanda Batten (I-R): Lean Democratic
HD-86, A.C. Cordoza (I-R): Lean Democratic
HD-89, Baxter Ennis (I-R, Retiring): Likely Democratic
I’m not going to go into detail about my choices there in this article- you can read my past ones if you want to see my explanations on these seats. But let’s get into what you’ve all been waiting to see- my final calls in the House of Delegates.
HD-22: Tossup to Lean Democratic: Starting off with a tough one, we go to one of the most GOP leaning seats in Northern Virginia. While not Trump-won like the Loudoun based 30th district or the Stafford based 64th District, Kamala Harris won this seat by only 501 votes in 2024, which did not make it impossible for Republican Ian Lovejoy to hold onto this seat this year. I’m not particularly impressed by the Democratic nominee, in former Delegate Elizabeth Guzman here either. Guzman’s former seat, while close at the topline level, was a gerrymandered seat that put strong Democratic partisans in Prince William County with strong Republican partisans in Fauquier County. That allowed Guzman to support and vote for very partisan bills in the House while there, and she leaned into the progressive wing to win in her old seat. The current 22nd District is not like that- this is a seat that is much more dependent on swing voters. And I think that could see Guzman underperform how the top of the Democratic ticket will do in this seat. But the government shutdown I think is going to kill GOP hopes across NOVA (this will become a pattern) and I think kills Lovejoy here. Guzman is also killing Lovejoy over the air, and that’s enough for me to consider her the favorite heading into tomorrow.
HD-30: Tossup to Lean Democratic: Speaking of Northern Virginia- hi Loudoun County. This Western Loudoun seat (that takes in a few precincts from Northern Fauquier County) was closer than expected in 2023 after GOP nominee Geary Higgins ran a relatively underwhelming campaign. Higgins does have incumbency on his side this time, but his campaign seems to be as underwhelming as it was two years ago. Combined with a more active campaign from his Democratic opponent this time, John McAuliff (not McAuliffe, like Terry), Higgins has been outran in terms of fundraising and ad spend. Now, and I’ve talked about this here before, but Republicans have been outraised and outspent in Virginia in these House seats for the past four years, even in 2021. So it is not the be all end all (and this will become a point in other seats I talk about in this article), but McAuliff is outpacing Higgins on the air by just a hair over $1.5 Million this cycle. That is a difference that can’t be ignored. This combined with the government shutdown is enough for me to say that this seat, by what I think will be a very narrow margin, will go for John McAuliff. If it was just the massive outspending or just the government shutdown, I do think Higgins could survive. But the combination of both will end him here. Lean D.
HD-41: Tossup to Lean Democratic: I actually moved this seat, based around Blacksburg and currently held by Republican Chris Obenshain, from Leans Democratic to Tossup about two weeks ago. My reasoning for that is that Obenshain, after a relatively quiet campaign from him in 2023 nearly saw him blow this seat to Lily Franklin (who’s back as the nominee this year), was actually matching Franklin in fundraising and was outpacing her on ad spending. While Franklin has now outpaced Obenshain in fundraising and is beating him in terms of ad spending, albeit very narrowly, it’s interesting to see a Republican keeping pace, when this is a category they’ve been beaten down in even in successful years in recent cycles. In fact, if you include outside spending with the ad spending, Obenshain is actually narrowly beating Franklin in that category. But the reason I’m pushing this back to Lean Democratic is because of voter registration trends in and around Blacksburg. Democrats are far outpacing their 2021 pace this year in and around the city that holds Virginia Tech and that is a sign that heavily favors the Democrat Franklin. Now- it would be extremely funny if part of this was an increasingly Republican leaning group of young men, which could narrowly swing the election to Obenshain. That seems unlikely though, and the data points to a Franklin win, which equals Lean Democratic.
HD-64: Tossup to Lean Democratic: The first of my “surprises” here. Yes, I do think Paul Milde loses. I’ve never been particularly trustworthy of Milde as a candidate. He primaried Bob Thomas in the old 28th District in 2019 and then proceeded to lose the general election. He then went on to primary the Republican incumbent in a Stafford County Supervisor District in 2021… and then lost the general even with the red wave that year. He did win by nine points in 2023, which beat expectations, though that may be more of a knock against 2023 Democratic nominee Leonard Lacey than a positive for Milde. Facing a much stiffer test this time from Democrat Stacey Carroll, Milde has been outraised financially by $1.8 Million and outspent over the air by $1.2 Million. That’s an issue for Milde. A major one in fact, especially in a seat that is increasingly populated by transplants who work for the government. And the government is shut down. With the shutdown, I’m predicting a NOVA sweep for Democrats, and the 64th is the final piece to that puzzle.
HD-69: Tossup to Lean Republican: I moved this seat to tossup recently, with Democrat Mark Downey running a competent and strong campaign against incumbent Republican Chad Green. Now, similar to many other Republicans, Green has been out fundraised and outspent on the air. However, he has not been killed in the ad game to the extent a Milde or Higgins has. He’s down by $600,000 right now in terms of the ad battle, but that is a margin I’ve seen Republicans survive in both good and bad years. There’s also the added effect that there will be a left-leaning independent on the ballot this year in Valerie Beverley. I think there will just be enough support for Green where he survives this year. Now, with the amount of flips Democrats are likely to have this cycle, Green could end up at the top of their target list if he survives this year. And I do think he survives, but barely. Lean Republican.
HD-73: Tossup to Lean Republican: Chesterfield County has been homebase for the Democratic gains in and around the suburbs of Richmond since the turn of the decade. Because of that, this district has swung significantly left, going from a Trump won seat in 2020, to a Harris won seat in 2024, one of the very few across the entire country to do so. With that in mind, it would be fair to say that Freshman incumbent Mark Early is in some danger here. He’s been outraised a significant amount and been outspent on the air, which is a pattern for basically every Republican in competitive seats. But he has not been killed, like Higgins or Milde, but he’s not as “close” as Green is to Downey. This one is hard. And I’m putting myself out there with this call, and my reasoning is not necessarily statistically sound. But, I do think that the ticket splitting we will see for Jason Miyares, and whether he wins or loses, it will be a good amount of ticket splitting. In a place like Chesterfield County, where there’s many a swing voter, I think it’s possible that by ticket splitting for Miyares, there will be some number of voters who will be convinced to ticket split elsewhere. I believe that will help Republicans the most in competitive areas outside of Northern Virginia, and I am going to gamble heavy on my theory here. Early eeks out a win. Lean Republican.
HD-75: Tossup to Lean Republican: My other surprise of the final ratings, I do have incumbent Carrier Coyner surviving against all odds again. While this does sit as a Harris +6 seat, Coyner is a well known overperformer and Democrats have always struggled to turn out black voters in this seat, which is based around the city of Hopewell. And Democrats may be having that problem again. The 75th District is one of the few competitive seats that have seen less than 14,000 early votes (at the time of writing this at 6:37 on Sunday night), which again, could signify Democrat issues with turnout. Democrat nominee Lindsey Dougherty also has a bit of a Paul Milde vibe to her. While she’s never successfully primaried anyone, she got blown out by Coyner in 2019 when the old version of this seat, the 62nd, was an open seat and she also lost a winnable supervisor race in 2023 when Democrats were pulling upsets across Chesterfield. I don’t know- I’m just not convinced this is the candidate that takes out Coyner. I could be incredibly wrong and Coyner can easily be a good candidate that is a victim of a blue wave. But I just don’t see it- not yet this time around. Lean Republican.
HD-82: Tossup to Lean Democratic: This race, a rematch of 2023 between incumbent Republican Kim Taylor and Democrat Kimberly Pope Adams, is another one seat where Democrats are heavily focused on turning out their black voter base. This is one of the few seats that have seen a legitimate shift towards Donald Trump since 2016, but Taylor still only pulled out a very narrow win in 2023, winning by only 78 votes. Early vote turnout has also been better here, which Democrats will be encouraged by, with just under 16,000 early votes having been tabulated at the time of writing. Taylor has also been blown out over the air, which is wild for a mostly rural district. Adams has outspent the incumbent by over $1.3 Million in ads this year, and considering how narrowly she lost last time around, I think the environment is there for Adams to knock off Taylor this year. It’s been impressive for Republicans to make it two straight cycles holding on to the House seat centered around the heavily Democratic leaning city of Petersburg, but the streak ends this year. Lean Democratic.