Sen. Tim Kaine (D-VA) announced his candidacy for reelection in a Friday meeting with Richmond business leaders, recorded by CSPAN.
The vice presidential pick of former First Lady Hillary Clinton during her 2016 presidential campaign eased party leaders’ minds with his announcement.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) is term-limited by a state Constitution prohibition against consecutive gubernatorial terms. He, therefore, is a likely challenger for Kaines’ senate seat in 2024, according to a Washington Post report.
The Conservative Brief further reported:
Virginia Democrat Sen. Tim Kaine, who was the vice presidential pick of former Democrat presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016, will run for re-election. The senator made the announcement in the state capital of Richmond on Friday, Fox News reported.
“I am happy to announce that I will seek re-election in 2024 to keep delivering results for Virginia. I’ve been honored to serve people as a missionary, civil rights lawyer, and elected official at the local, state, and federal levels. I love the Commonwealth and its citizens and want to keep being your Senator. I’m a servant, I love Virginia, I’m proud of what I’ve done, I’ve got a whole lot more to do,” Kaine said.
The Washington Post reported he may have a challenger in Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
Kaine will be seeking reelection under a decidedly different environment than in his last race when a Democrat was in the executive mansion and his opponent, Corey Stewart, turned off moderate Virginians with hard-right positions and staunch support for Confederate statues. Kaine won by 16 points. He won by 6 in 2012 against former Virginia governor and senator George Allen.
Though Kaine is still considered well-positioned to keep his seat, Republicans have been energized by Youngkin’s victory in 2021 over former governor Terry McAuliffe (D) by about 2 percentage points, and have been motivated to keep the momentum going.
Whether the governor could be a contender for the seat himself remains an open question; Virginia governors cannot seek consecutive terms. Youngkin’s ambitions have been under a microscope, as the governor has launched two political-action committees, met with megadonors, and crisscrossed the state stumping for GOP gubernatorial candidates during the midterms. Youngkin has frequently deflected suggestions he is eyeing a White House bid — but others haven’t ruled out a Senate run.
Former Arizona Republican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake’s campaign has responded to rumors that she is considering a run for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by Krysten Sinema, who left her party months ago and is now a self-declared Independent, though she still caucuses with Democrats.
“I’m told Kari Lake is considering running for the US Senate seat held by Kyrsten Sinema in 2024,” CNN political reporter Kate Sullivan posted Monday afternoon on Twitter.
But according to Becker News, that isn’t the case at all — at least, not yet.
In a statement to the news site, Lake’s campaign said, “Kari is hyper-focused on winning her court case as she is the duly elected Governor and her Election Case proves that.” Lake is currently attempting to legally address November election issues she says cost her a victory against then-Democratic Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, who was sworn in as Arizona’s new governor earlier this month.
“Hundreds of thousands of invalid ballots were counted in Maricopa County alone, more than 60% of Election Day voting centers were sabotaged causing lines of 4 hours or more at some locations, the wrong ballot image was printed on Election Day ballots causing tabulators to jam and spit out ballots, 25K ballots were mysteriously added to the official vote count two days after the elections and more than 100K ballots with rejected signatures were counted anyway. That is just a bit of what went wrong in Arizona. Kari Lake is fighting to protect the sacred vote of the People of Arizona,” the statement to Becker News continued.
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