Democrat Abigail Spanberger won Virginia’s election for governor on Tuesday, the first of several contests that will serve as an early gauge of how Americans are responding to President Donald Trump’s tumultuous nine months in office.
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Spanberger, 46, a former congresswoman and CIA officer, will be the first woman to serve as Virginia’s governor after easily defeating Republican Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears.
Meanwhile, in New Jersey’s gubernatorial contest, Decision Desk HQ, a non-partisan forecaster, projected that Democrat Mikie Sherrill would defeat Republican Jack Ciattarelli. Other news outlets had yet to name a winner.
Across the river in New York City’s mayoral race, Democratic nominee Zohran Mamdani, a 34-year-old democratic socialist, faced 67-year-old Andrew Cuomo, the former governor who ran as an independent after losing to Mamdani in the primary. The campaign laid bare the Democratic Party’s generational and ideological divides as it seeks to rehabilitate its damaged brand.
In California, voters were deciding whether to give Democratic lawmakers the power to redraw the state’s congressional map, expanding a national battle over redistricting that could determine which party controls the US House of Representatives after next year’s midterm elections.
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Democrats were watching Tuesday’s results carefully, with the party locked out of power in Washington and struggling to find consensus on the best way to oppose Trump, a Republican, and find a path out of the political wilderness.