But the Polls...

The only numbers that matter are votes

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

As a recent transplant from Northern Virginia, I watched yesterday’s elections closely not just because we lived there, but because Virginia elections are a bellwether for the following year's major national elections. Virginia holds off-cycle, odd-numbered year elections that offer tangible insight into what’s on the minds of voters as opposed to nebulous and overly sensationalized polling data.

The 2021 gubernatorial election ushered in the milquetoast, Patagonia vest-wearing, Mr. MAGA-in-loafers Glenn Youngkin. His victory was a rude awakening for Democrats after winning the federal trifecta the previous year. Youngkin came on the heels of COVID lockdowns, indicating that far too many hadn’t fully rejected the authoritarian-curious Republican party. It was my second election as a civilian and I endorsed and campaigned for Terry McAuliffe, so I took that loss a bit personally. It wasn’t that I felt an intense affiliation with McAuliffe, I never met h…