Republicans managed to flip the Virginia governorship in 2021 largely on an education platform, focusing on parents’ concerns over peak-pandemic public school closings and race-based curricula.
Four years later, the party is aiming to retool its “parents’ rights” campaign in its bid to hold on to the office in the blue-leaning state in a post-Covid era.
Republicans in recent years have sought to expand their education and cultural playbook in Virginia and around the country. While Republicans once zeroed in on critical race theory, the target is now diversity, equity and inclusion policies. And they’ve broadened their focus to preventing transgender students from competing in girls’ and women’s sports.
This fall’s governor’s race, which both parties will look to as a bellwether of the broader political environment, will provide a major test of the message’s staying power.
“It will be a big part of their campaign, just as it was in 2021,” said Virginia-based Republican strategist Zack Roday. “It first nicely into the ‘common-sense arguments.’ It fits nice in there with ‘kitchen-table issues.’”
“It’s a great way to put Democrats on defense,” he said.
Fueled by parents’ frustrations over school closings during the pandemic, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin leaned hard into the issue during his successful 2021 run, making his closing message almost entirely about education. At the time, it was an issue Democrats had traditionally campaigned on more than Republicans.
Republican candidates for governor in many other states jumped on the bandwagon, many of whom invited Youngkin to campaign with them.
From there, the issue expanded on the trail. In Wisconsin, Florida and elsewhere, Republicans weaponized allegations that critical race theory was being taught in public school classrooms. In Nevada, Joe Lombardo, who won his race for governor, added school safety and broader curriculum fears to the recipe.
Across the nation, state-level Republicans pushed a new wave of “parents’ bills of rights,” many of which wrapped in laws around transgender youth.
President Donald Trump also emphasized the issue during the 2024 campaign. After he won, the Trump-aligned America First Legal Foundation, unveiled a “Parents’ Rights Toolkit” for states and the federal government.
Since taking office, Trump has signed executive orders intending to “end radical indoctrination” in the nation’s public schools and blocking transgender women and girls from participating in female sports.
Now, the issue is set to be front and center once again in Virginia, which is hosting one of just two governor’s races this year.
Youngkin is term-limited, leading to open primaries on both sides, but there are already clear front-runners for both parties. On the Republican side, Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears is the only serious candidate. For Democrats, former Rep. Abigail Spanberger is the only declared candidate, although Rep. Bobby Scott is thought to be exploring a run.
While economic issues and reproductive rights promise to feature prominently in the race as well, Republicans say they’ll double down on parents’ rights and education.
“Republicans for many years now have understood that parents’ rights is a broad set of issues, and I think Democrats still have not quite learned that lesson,” said Dave Abrams, a consultant to the Earle-Sears campaign.
Earle-Sears and her allies are rushing to emphasize that Spanberger, while in the U.S. House, voted against a federal “Parents Bill of Rights.”
In a statement, Earle-Sears said her mission “never stops” to “give parents the voice and transparency they deserve.”
“We’ve delivered meaningful results in Virginia’s education, and we’ll continue to do so when I’m governor,” she added.
Democrats, for their part, say the issue is not the weakness for them that Republicans say it is.
They point to the unique salience of the issue in Virginia in 2021 due to the pandemic — and an eleventh-hour remark by Democrat Terry McAuliffe. “I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach,” McAuliffe said at a debate, which featured heavily in Younkin’s campaign ads.
Democrats also note that several other Republicans who leaned into the issue in competitive gubernatorial campaigns over the last three years didn’t win.
Republicans “have consistently tried and failed to run on toxic culture wars in governor’s races in 2022, 2023 and 2024, pitting parents against teachers when talking about public education,” said Democratic Governors Association spokesperson Sam Newton. “When it comes to public education, we have the advantage because Republicans support plans that are trying to rip away funding, and that hurts kids, teachers and parents.”
“Democrats are the ones talking about trying to make their life better and make schools better and provide more help for kids, and try to recruit and pay teachers better,” Newton said.
Spanberger’s allies said she’ll attempt to employ traditional Democratic messaging on the issue — for example, touting stronger funding of public education — while also playing up the fact that she’s a mother of three school-age children.
“Abigail Spanberger is a proud public school mom with three daughters in Virginia public schools — one in elementary school, one in middle school, and one in high school. She believes that parents not only have the right to be involved in their children’s education, but that their involvement is essential to their children’s success and the success of their larger school community,” Connor Joseph, a spokesperson for the Spanberger campaign, said in a statement. “Virginia parents — and their children — deserve a Governor who is laser-focused on making Virginia’s K-12 schools the best in America.”
Virginia Democrats also argued there are several other prominent issues that are likely to define the race that they feel work to their advantage, including reproductive rights and Trump’s policies that have impacted federal workers, a significant number of whom live in northern Virginia.
Virginia has still leaned blue at the presidential level in recent cycles, even as Youngkin won by about 2 points in 2021. Still, Trump managed to cut his margin of defeat to less than 6 points in Virginia in 2024, down from 10 in 2020.
Republicans also think Earle-Sears will benefit from Youngkin’s relatively high approval ratings as he heads into his last year in office. Youngkin was quick to endorse Earle-Sears, who has tied herself closely to the governor and his record.
“As a whole, people are happy with Gov. Youngkin and his administration. So framing the majority of issues in the state as a continuation of those for Republicans in this race is going to be helpful to keep talking about. You know: ‘Hey, we did this. We have to keep it going. The work is not done.’ And that applies to cost of living and taxes, but it also applies to education and parents’ involvement,” said Republican Governors Association communications director Courtney Alexander.
“Republicans can wear it as a feather in their cap, and there’s no reason to not continue touting that. It was a win, it produced results, and it’s still an issue. It’s not going to go away. Parents don’t suddenly care less about their kids’ education,” she added.
