Senator Lucas Lays Down a Marker as the Sun Rises on the Black Power Shift to Hampton Roads
Virginia's Most Powerful Black Woman Lawmaker "Goes There" on Race and Region
“There are people working to shut Black leaders out of key positions and hiding behind regional arguments. Today I am going to call them out publicly,” State Senator L. Louise Lucas
WHERE’S THE SUPPORT FOR BLACK GIRL MAGIC NOW? Weeks after former Delegate Jennifer Carroll Foy’s opponent, former Del. Hala Ayala, received the endorsements of Dominion Energy supporting establishment figures in the form of Ralph Northam and Terry McAuliffe, comes a tweet thread by the most senior and most powerful Black woman Democrat in state government in Virginia.
SENATOR LUCAS AND A POWER SHIFT IN VIRGINIA. The establishment support against Foy, an attorney and, like Northam, a VMI graduate, were a surprise to no one since Foy ran for Governor without “permission” in 2021 and then proceeded to take on McAuliffe directly on ethics and the need for new leadership and not going “back to the past.” In 2021, McAuliffe won the primary over his four opponents by a wide margin before losing to Glenn Youngkin, but the lines of battle, establishment vs. new generation, Dominion vs. Clean Energy, and so on, were clear.
The other elephant in the room was the Democratic party’s treatment of Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax as so-called woke progressives claim to care about “racial justice” while owning a position of automatic guilt-upon-allegation with no investigation regarding the second only Black statewide official in Virginia’s history — as if 2019 was 1823. Even after the FBI entered the story in 2021, some white NoVA “progressives” continue a narrative to this day that evidences their racial double standard on due process and Black men.
Two years after three Black Democrats (Foy, Congresswoman Jennifer McClellan and Fairfax), ran for Governor in 2021 we see the continuing emergence of Black candidates and elected officials in Virginia at various stages of their power. Lucas, Rep. Bobby Scott and Virginia House Minority Leader Don Scott are at or near the pinnacle of that power — and they’re all from Hampton Roads.
Yesterday, the most powerful Black woman in Virginia politics, State Senator L. Louise Lucas of Portsmouth, made her feelings known on social media yesterday and late last night regarding, “Black voters down state and voters in Northern Virginia.”
Every seat in the Virginia General Assembly is up for consideration in 2023. Several competitive races for the June 20 primary are ongoing. Because of redistricting, a primary battle in Senate District 18 between two Black Senators, Senator Lucas and State Senator Lionel Spruill, is now underway. What many political observers guessed after it was confirmed neither would move to another district is evidenced in this moment: This primary will be contentious.
“I usually stand by and don’t call out bullshit publicly. But to have colleagues working to raise money to try to defeat me because they don’t want communities like mine to have the kind of influence and power I have accumulated meant that I had to speak up. Enough is enough,” wrote Senator Lucas ten minutes after midnight last night.
Lucas was referring to a fundraiser organized by several northern Virginia Democrats for Spruill planned in Tysons, Va. on May 15 featuring State Senator George Barker, a seniority rival of Lucas’ for Chair of Finance, and State Senator Scott Surovell, who is competing against State Senator Mamie Locke for Caucus Chair of Hampton. The rare sight of sitting elected officials campaigning against a colleague prompted Lucas. What’s at stake? The Chair of the the most powerful committee in the General Assembly: Senate Finance.
Internal party leadership questions will be decided by the Senate Democratic Caucus next year. But one thing is now certain: There will be a “new look” caucus with several younger members present after retirements and primaries related to redistricting changes.
The power shift is on — and it’s moving to Hampton Roads and over to Black elected officials who represent Black voters who have been securing victories for the Democratic Party in Virginia for decades. The growth in power is seen years after the retirements of NoVa Reps. Frank Wolf and Jim Moran as Rep. Bobby Scott took power as ranking member and then Chair of the U.S. House Committee on Education and the Workforce (despite efforts of local media to ignore his work).
A power shift was also seen in June 2022 when Delegate Don Scott (no relation to Bobby Scott but they are both Alphas🤙🏽) defeated former Virginia House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn for the position of Democratic Leader in the Virginia House.
Leader Don Scott’s victory was one of boldest inter-party moves in years and involved a diverse coalition of support from Democrats from NoVa to central Virginia to Hampton Roads. That “minority” leader position could become House Speaker should Democrats win back the majority in November 2023 and run the show in the Virginia House in January 2024. Leader Scott would become the first Black Speaker of the Virginia House and Democrats would have two historic Speakers in a row since Filler-Corn made double-history as the first woman and first Jewish Speaker of the Virginia House. Filler-Corn announced her retirement from the Virginia House in March after her current term but is expected to run for Governor of Virginia in 2025.
This year a record number of Black candidates are running for office in Virginia. Yesterday another Black candidate filed to run for office in HD49, U.S. Marine Corps veteran Jasmine Lipscomb. The district covers Danville and South Boston. Lipscomb’s candidacy is the result of the recruiting of 90 for 90s Fergie Reid, Jr. — the son of the first African-American elected to the Virginia Assembly since Reconstruction, William Ferguson Reid, Sr., who is 98.
Many more questions will arise out of the issues Senator Lucas is placing front and center. Will Northam and McAuliffe endorses Lucas or Spruill or stay out of it? Does it matter to voters in SD18? Early voting begins in a few weeks.
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