Democrats have crowned Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) their affordability champion — a move Republicans argue is already unraveling less than a month into her tenure.
The party’s uplifting of Spanberger, who promised during her 2025 campaign to bring down prices, was on full display when she was tapped to deliver the Democratic rebuttal to President Donald Trump’s State of the Union Tuesday night.
“So, let’s speak plainly and honestly, and let me ask you three questions,” Spanberger said at the top of her remarks. “Is the president working to make life more affordable for you and your family? Is the president working to keep Americans safe — both at home and abroad? Is the president working for you?”
Yet, only one month in office, Republicans say that it’s Spanberger who isn’t working for the voters who helped put her into the governor’s office by 12 percentage points.
“In just a few weeks as governor, Abigail Spanberger has turned Virginia into a Sanctuary State, driven major businesses out of Virginia, and pushed to raise taxes on Virginia families,” said Kollin Crompton, the deputy communications director for the Republican Governors’ Association. “Life is harder now under Spanberger than it was under Republican leadership in Virginia, and it should serve as a warning sign to every voter in the midterms.”
In her remarks, Spanberger touted the advancement of her “Affordable Virginia Agenda” package — a set of bills passed by the Virginia legislature to deal with energy prices, prescription drug costs, and housing affordability, among other issues.
The legislation is facing criticism for not doing enough, however. Brian Kirwin, a Republican strategist, called the bills, “nothing proposals.”
“They’re like, form a task force on this, do a study on this. She’s a one-term governor, limited by the Constitution, and her big agenda was to form task force and commissions, and studies,” Kirwin said. “No, it’s softball. No commission or study or task force has ever made life more affordable, and none of them have ever acted quickly. So it’s a whole bunch of window dressing.”
On her first day in office, Spanberger instituted several Democratic priorities via executive order, including one prohibiting discrimination in state hiring on the basis of gender identity. Spanberger also rescinded a previous directive by former Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, allowing local law enforcement to support federal immigration authorities with deportation efforts.
“Every minute spent sowing fear is a minute not spent investigating murders, crimes against children, or the criminals defrauding seniors of their life savings,” Spanberger said during Tuesday’s speech.
Spanberger has also signed a new redistricting initiative by the Democratic-controlled Virginia legislature. The initiative, which requires voter approval in an April special election, would erase the current 6-5 Democrat-to-Republican makeup of the state’s congressional delegation. The new maps are drawn to provide Democrats with 10 seats to the GOP’s one.
The Virginia Democrat had previously said she had “no plans” to redistrict in Virginia. That changed after Republicans redrew congressional maps in Texas and Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) pushed through a redraw via state referendum last year.
Rep. Ben Cline (R-VA), whose seat could be eviscerated if Spanberger’s redraw passes, said Spanberger only got her party’s “plum speaking assignment because she’s a model for how two-faced Democrats need their candidates to be.”
“If she told the truth on the campaign trail, she would never have been elected, so she concealed her true leftist agenda, as well as her plans to gerrymander Virginia’s congressional map, until after she had taken office,” Cline said. “Now she’s attempting to steal four Republican congressional seats, and this little speech was her reward.”
Bob Holsworth, a political analyst in Virginia, told the Washington Examiner that not all of the blame could be laid at Spanberger’s feet and some of it was just pragmatic politics given the governor has a Democratic legislature.
“The last thing I think she wanted to do was to undermine the legislative leadership by not signing on to that map,” Holsworth said of the redistricting effort. “At the same time, you know, and she’s made the argument, ‘Well, it’s just simply a response to Trump.’ But will she be, if the legislative, the courts, allow this, will she spend a month out there campaigning for it? I doubt it.”
Virginia’s Democratic legislature has also proposed dozens of new tax proposals, leaving Republicans an opening to accuse her administration of seeking to raise taxes, though Spanberger has not signed any into law yet.
“Families across Virginia are struggling with the cost of groceries, gas, housing, and electricity,” said Rep. Rob Wittman (R-VA), another lawmaker whose reelection hopes will be damaged if the governor gets her redistricting wish. “Yet, while she talks about affordability, the Democrat-controlled legislature is advancing more than 50 new taxes and fees on rideshares, deliveries, digital services, vehicle repairs, and even electricity bills.”
Despite GOP criticism of her affordability credentials, Democrats are rallying around their rising star.
INSIDE THE CHAMBER: TRUMP GETS UNDER DEMOCRATS’ SKIN AT STATE OF THE UNION
Spanberger “knows this time period that we’re in right now, what Americans want to hear when we’ve had a year or two of Donald Trump, and how we can hold him accountable,” Democratic National Committee Deputy Communications Director Hannah Muldavin said on LiveNOW with Fox shortly after the rebuttal.
Spanberger’s office did not respond to a request for comment on this story.
Discount Applied Successfully!
Your savings have been added to the cart.