RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Seizing his party’s first major Trump-era victory, Democrat Ralph Northam beat back a charge from Republican Ed Gillespie in the race for Virginia governor, a bruising election that tested the power of President Donald Trump’s fiery nationalism against the energy of the Trump resistance.
In Virginia, as in several contests across America on Tuesday, the Trump resistance won. And it wasn’t close.
Northam, a pediatric neurologist and Army veteran, defeated longtime Republican operative Gillespie in the hard-fought contest.
“I think what this message was yesterday that Virginia sent not only to this country, but to this world, is that the divisiveness, the hatred, the bigotry, the politics that is tearing this country apart, that’s not the United States of America that people love,” Northam said Wednesday at a news conference at Virginia’s Capitol.