Jay Jones No Longer Leads in Virginia AG Race After Text Scandal

On Oct. 3, the National Review published a story revealing text messages from Virginia Democratic attorney general nominee Jay Jones fantasizing about shooting Todd Gilbert, the Virginia House speaker at the time of the messages, and about wishing Gilbert’s children would die. Before the messages were made public, Jones held a narrow lead in several polls, but new surveys show that advantage has vanished as Republican Jason Miyares moves ahead.

In a poll from Christopher Newport University, taken from Sept. 29 to Oct. 1, which was before the text messages were shown to the public, Jones led by six points, which was less than gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger’s lead over Winsome Earle-Sears at 10 points.

However, in polls since the scandal, incumbent Republican attorney general candidate Jason Miyares has started to lead. In a Cygnal poll taken Oct. 6-7, Miyares led by two points, 46%-44%, and in a Trafalgar Group poll taken Oct. 8-10, Miyares led by six points.

The leaked texts were between Jones and Virginia House of Delegates member Carrie Coyner. In them, Jones describes a situation where Gilbert “gets two bullets to the head.” In another screenshot, Coyner says that Jones was “hopping [sic] jennifer Gilbert’s children would die,” and Jones affirmed, saying, “Yes, I’ve told you this before. Only when people feel pain personally do they move on policy.”

In these same polls where Jones is trailing, Abigail Spanberger still led. The Cygnal poll had Sears up four points, and Trafalgar had her up by three points. In the RCP Average for the Virginia Governor’s Race, she currently leads by 6.5 points.

This indicates that while the text messages hurt Jay Jones’ prospects of becoming the next attorney general, the gubernatorial election is still soundly in Spanberger’s hands. In betting markets, Spanberger has a 92% chance of winning. Before the story was released, Jones had a similar likelihood of winning at 88%, but now Miyares leads with a 63% chance.

A split ticket where Virginia elects a Democrat for governor but a Republican for attorney general hasn’t happened since 2005. In the 2005 Virginia State elections, Virginians elected Tim Kaine, who later went on to be Hillary Clinton’s 2016 running mate, as governor, while electing Republican Bob McDonnell as attorney general. A similar situation happened in 2001, when Democrat Mark Warner was elected governor while Republican Jerry Kilgore was elected attorney general.

The other possibly competitive race in Virginia is the lieutenant governor’s contest. A Trafalgar Group poll shows Democrat Ghazala Hasmi leading Republican John Reid by one point, while a Christopher Newport University poll found Hasmi ahead by nine points.