Former Democratic Rep. Abigail Spanberger, her party’s nominee for Virginia governor, is fundraising with Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, with just 11 days to go before Election Day.
Virginia, one of two states electing a new governor on Nov. 4, serves as the Democrats’ first chance to flip a governor’s mansion during President Donald Trump’s second term. The joint fundraising effort is platformed by ActBlue, a key part of the Democratic Party’s digital fundraising efforts which has faced scrutiny from Republicans in Congress as well as Trumpover fraud prevention and internal issues.
“This week, Trump endorsed Abigail Spanberger’s Republican opponent in the Virginia Governor’s race, and she’s being attacked with vicious ads online,” the website reads. “This is the only election where we might flip a Governor’s office from red to blue this year. We need to support Abigail in this critical moment.”
Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign is calling for donations that would be split evenly for both the candidates. The congresswoman is also actively promoting Spanberger in digital press releases where she highlights her past collaborations with Spanberger during their overlapping time in Congress. Both Spanberger and Ocasio-Cortez were first elected to the House in 2018.
“Abigail is still demanding better — and now, she’s running for Governor of Virginia in the only election where we might flip a Governor’s office from red to blue this year,” Ocasio-Cortez’s email says.
The move to join forces with Ocasio-Cortez comes as Spanberger’s campaign funds triple that of her opponent, Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, whom Trump announced his support for her on Oct. 19. Campaign finance reports released in September show Spanberger has raised over $40 million while Earle-Sears has raked in nearly $17 million. Spanberger’s cash on hand also surpasses Earle-Sears’ by $4 million.
Recent polling indicates the gubernatorial race is likely to be decided by a single-digit margin, as Spanberger was leading Earle-Sears 52%-43% in a Suffolk University poll released Thursday.
Spanberger, previously possessed a larger lead over Earle-Sears, saw her margin shrink after her silence on Arlington Public Schools’ decision to allow students to use bathrooms and locker rooms based on gender identity. The Trump administration had found the district was in violation of civil rights law for alleged illegal discrimination against women.
Democrats took another hit in their effort to flip Virginia’s three statewide offices when three-year-old texts from Jay Jones, the party’s nominee for Attorney General, surfaced in which he compared then-Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert to Adolf Hitler and Pol Pot. Jones also said if he had two bullets, he would use them both to shoot Gilbert in the head over Hitler and Pot.
The texts, as well as an alleged phone call from 2022 where Jones said he wished Gilbert’s wife “could watch her own child die in her arms so that [he] might reconsider his political views,” were first reported by the National Review.
Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin is term-limited.
Abigail Spanberger and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s campaigns did not respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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