How to Destroy a State, in Five Easy Steps

There’s an old saying about how our two parties handle defeat and victory differently. When Republicans lose, they fear that they will never win again. When Democrats win, they govern as though they will never have to win again. Virginia offers proof of the maxim. 

As Virginia’s attorney general from 2022 to 2026, I worked alongside Governor Glenn Youngkin to rebuild a state in disrepair. When we took office, Virginia ranked 46th out of 50 in post-Covid job creation. Our schools were among the last in the country to reopen. The murder rate had reached a 20-year high. Fentanyl overdose deaths hit new records. People and businesses were voting with their feet. For the first time in a century, Virginia experienced eight consecutive years of net population loss. 

Commonsense conservative ideas and leadership changed the trajectory. Under Youngkin, Virginia climbed from the bottom tier of job creation to the top five. Smart fiscal discipline produced budget surpluses every year, even while delivering more than $9 billion in tax relief. Over $156 billion in new business investment flowed into the Commonwealth, more than under the previous six governors combined. The murder rate fell. Virginia led the nation in reducing drug overdose deaths because we chose to work with law enforcement rather than against them. Some dubbed it the “Virginia Renaissance.” 

But Virginia Democrats have rejected that Renaissance. In doing so, Governor Abigail Spanberger has managed to become one of the least popular governors in modern state history after a little more than half a year in office. It happened in five easy steps. 

Step one: raise taxes, expand regulations, and drive away businesses. Richmond Democrats appear determined to dismantle the Commonwealth’s healthy business climate. According to one analysis, Virginia Democrats have proposed more than $37 billion in new taxes in 2026 alone, despite a budget surplus that Governor Youngkin’s policies produced. Democrats have enacted a sweeping payroll tax and a carbon tax. The Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy estimates that new regulatory burdens have increased the effective cost of hiring in Virginia by 22.5 percent. Under Spanberger, Boeing, Amazon, and many others have announced closures or layoffs in the Commonwealth. 

Step two: impose an energy tax under the guise of environmental policy. Virginia must double its baseload electricity capacity over the next decade to meet growing demand. The rational response would be expanding natural gas and nuclear energy—all proven, reliable, and affordable energy sources. Instead, the Spanberger administration is pushing energy suicide by advancing an extreme green agenda centered on intermittent wind and solar power. Democrats are forcing ratepayers to purchase “renewable energy credits” that generate no actual electricity but function as a de facto tax. This carbon tax has already cost Virginians hundreds of millions of dollars annually. The projected cost exceeds $1 billion per year. 

Step three: prioritize offenders over victims and abandon cooperation with federal law enforcement. Under the Democrats’ “Enhanced Earned Sentence Credits” program, more than 9,000 convicted felons have been released early, some with decades remaining on their sentences. Nearly half have already been rearrested. As a former prosecutor, I can affirm that justice means accountability, and accountability means serving the sentence imposed. Equally troubling is that one of Governor Spanberger’s first official acts was ordering state law enforcement to stop cooperating with federal authorities on the deportation of violent illegal immigrants, including individuals convicted of rape and murder. This policy puts innocent Virginians at risk. 

Step four: undermine right-to-work and force collective bargaining on local governments. Virginia’s right-to-work law is foundational to attracting and retaining manufacturing jobs. In Congress, Spanberger was a co-sponsor of the PRO Act, which would have abolished right-to-work protections in 27 states, including Virginia. As governor, she is poised to sign mandatory collective bargaining legislation that forces all government employees into bargaining units, stripping local governments of flexibility and all but guaranteeing property tax increases across the board. Only intraparty squabbles between Spanberger and the Democratic-controlled Assembly over an enactment date prevented these provisions from becoming law in 2026. Chesterfield County alone estimates the cost to its taxpayers at $200 million per year. Extrapolated across Virginia, the fiscal damage becomes clear. 

Step five: attempt to gerrymander the congressional map in defiance of the state constitution. In 2020, Virginia voters amended their Constitution by a two-thirds supermajority in favor of nonpartisan redistricting. Governor Spanberger, who campaigned as a pragmatic leader who would transcend party politics, supported an egregious partisan gerrymander, under which the 46 percent of Virginians who voted Republican in 2024 would have held approximately 9 percent of congressional seats. Thankfully, the Supreme Court of Virginia struck down the power grab, but the damage to Spanberger’s credibility is done. 

The Virginia Renaissance was the product of principled, disciplined governance focused on the people rather than the political class. What is unfolding now in Richmond is its deliberate undoing. Businesses and families will make their own calculations about whether to stay or go. History, and the voters, will render their verdict in time.