Glenn Youngkin was caught – again – badmouthing the COVID vaccine before last night’s debate, but he made up for it by doubling down on it. Then he said he’d support Trump in 2024 if the latter is nominated for President.
The first problem for the Republican nominee came when The American Independent [1] (despite the name, it’s very left of center) released video of him promising to reverse COVID vaccine mandates for state employees.
Yeah. So what I can do… One thing I can do is, I can remove the mandate from state employees. That’s the one thing, legally, I can do on Day One. I can say state employees are no longer mandated to get the vaccine.
It should surprise no one that the issue came up in last night’s debate.
Youngkin has a history of talking out of both sides of his mouth on things, but this time he chose to plant his flag on vaccine hesitancy [2], replacing reams of data with his own self-assurance in insisting, “This is a vaccine that people don’t fully, fully understand yet.”
As if that wasn’t enough, Youngkin later promised to support [3] ex-President Trump if he (Trump) won the 2024 GOP nomination. It was about the most definitive thing Youngkin has said on the campaign trail, and it should be remembered by any voter wondering what GOP-controlled election boards would do for Trump in 2024 [4]. No matter what the RPV tries to tell anyone, Donald Trump refuses to fade into the past.
Speaking of the past, one can go back far enough to remember a time when the Democratic nominee, Terry McAuliffe, would be called out for his own word pretzel on Virginia’s right-to-work law. T-Mac took the Sure I’ll Sign That If It Ever Comes To My Desk (Which I Doubt It Ever Will) option, which is more than a little shady. Then again, George Bush the Younger went with SISTIIECTMD (WIDIEW) on the 1994 “assault weapon” ban and rode it all the way to re-election.
More to the point, T-Mac’s deliberate confusion on that issue pales in comparison to Youngkin openly pledging to use the Governor’s Mansion as a Trump Tower miniature in three years (and if that label bothers you, dear reader, please note the runner-up term in my brain was Insurrection Redux Outpost).
All in all, T-Mac’s plan was to give no one a reason to vote against him, and he largely accomplished that. Youngkin, by contrast, reminded us why we can’t risk giving him – or anyone else in his party – any governing power of any kind.