Virginia Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears filed paperwork on Wednesday to run for governor in 2025, seeking to continue the GOP’s control of the governor’s mansion as sitting Gov. Glenn Youngkin is limited to one term.
Earle-Sears’ filing makes her the first Republican candidate to jump into the 2025 governor’s race in the commonwealth, ABC 8 reported. Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA), who entered the race last November, is currently the only Democratic candidate running for governor.
The lieutenant governor announced she would hold a rally in Virginia Beach on Thursday at 6:00 p.m. ET.
Earle-Sears rode a wave of Republican victories in Virginia in 2021, winning her race for lieutenant governor over Democrat Hala Ayala by just over 50,000 votes. Republicans swept the statewide office elections in 2021, with Youngkin winning the gubernatorial election by more than 60,000 votes and Attorney General Jason Miyares winning his election by 26,000.
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Virginia law limits the governor’s and lieutenant governor’s time in office to one four-year term before they must step aside until the next election or run for a different position. Before Youngkin’s victory in 2021, Democrats had won four of the previous five gubernatorial elections in the commonwealth.
Earle-Sears, an immigrant from Jamaica, served in the U.S. Marines before being elected to the Virginia General Assembly in an upset over a 20-year Democratic incumbent in 2001. During her time as lieutenant governor, Earle-Sears has caught the ire of Democrats and the legacy media on multiple occasions.
In June 2023, Earle-Sears, who is black, slammed President Joe Biden’s appointment of Ketanji Brown-Jackson to the Supreme Court, saying, “Well, what you have is a justice who was chosen because she’s black and because she’s a woman.”
Earlier this year, Earle-Sears responded to a Democrat male state senator who identifies as a woman by saying, “Yes, sir.” The state senator, Danica Roem, stormed out of the room after Earle-Sears’ comment. Upon returning, Roem refused to speak after being recognized by Earle-Sears.
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“I said something that upset Sen. Roem. Let it be known I am not here to upset anyone,” she said. “I am here to do the job that the people of Virginia have called me to do and that is to treat everyone with respect and dignity. I myself have at times not been afforded that same respect and dignity, but in this body and as long as I am president of the Senate and by the grace of God, I will be treated with respect and dignity and I will treat everyone else with respect and dignity.”
