[RKBA Democrat]

Both. Coincidence AND something more.

Funny you mention VA. I worked the polls there in 2016 and it was a complete s***-show. And the VA gop ignored it in my view. I discounted it at the time as being a product of their usual incompetence. To this day I have some question in my mind as to whether DJT could’ve actually won VA in 2016. It was close. But there was little interest within the VA gop in finding out. There is little doubt in my mind that DJT lost VA in 2020.

I do think that Glenn Youngkin having a clue and making ballot security an issue preserved the win, but it didn’t generate the win. Terry McAwful was a ghoul with the charisma to match. Glenn Youngkin was a safe, inoffensive republican. Youngkin beat McAwful like a drum.

[nascarnation]

The Clintons have pretty much always had "toxic coattails" and the Va gov race certainly reinforced that premise.

[thoughtomator]

all three statewide candidates started at < 1% name recognition pulled almost exactly the same percentage of the final vote

this was an environment change

election integrity being seriously enforced was no small part of that change

part of that change came from the state party starting to get its shit together for the first time in 15 years

and a lot came from the war in Loudoun and the cascading failures that caused in Democrat messaging