In dissecting the vote for Spanberger over Earle-Sears in Tuesday’s election, a demographic breakdown of exit polling posted on NBC News indicates for us how to move forward into the midterm elections of 2026 and beyond.
The results show that the kind of white male chauvinism that has dominated Virginia and American politics at least since the Civil War is now the last bastion of Trumpism. White males were effectively the only demographic that performed well for Earle-Sears in the election, offering her up to 57 percent of their votes. Dividing lines can also be found in terms of age and educational level. So, the younger, the better educated, the more non-white, the more female, the more the votes went to Spanberger.
This presents itself as a formula for the future. Older white males are the last bastions of hope for the Trump agenda in Virginia, and they are on their way out of the political process. They will not be reproduced among younger, non-white groups, or among women, so long as the policies of Democrats clearly speak to the needs and aspirations of these folks.
The enemy, including those who control the major media and the algorithms that are defining choice on the Internet, really knows no other game than “divide and conquer” to keep this cohort of younger, better educated, more diverse and more socially progressive voters fighting among themselves over wholly secondary, potentially inflammatory issues.
As a good example, the only real issue that Earle-Sears could run on had to do with high school bathrooms, an extension of what she hoped would be a divisive transgender rights issue. It was lame. But in the past, that worked much better for Republicans seeking to divide their opponents, such as the way that the issue of Constitutional amendments to codify that “marriage is between one man and one woman” worked for George W. Bush in the presidential election of 2004.
Going forward, we can imagine they will try the same thing using the word, “socialist,” given the results in the New York mayor’s race, or variations on that theme.
So, the easy answer is to not fall for it. The major unifying theme of this election has been another single word, Trump, and all that it stands for. His backers are losing right now in every effort to pin the blame for the government shutdown, for example, or for inflation.
To extend this week’s election result into the midterms next year, Democrats must not fall into their enemies’ divisive traps, and to keep the focus on Trump and how he’s ripping the country apart. The differences Trump forces will try to exploit between so-called moderates and so-called socialists are minimal compared to the threat to democracy and the rule of law that Trump represents.
Trump is going to continue his impulsive and reprehensible behavior. It is not going to get easier on that front. But Tuesday’s election lights the way forward.