FALLS CHURCH, Va. (AP) – One of America’s most conservative congressmen faces a serious primary challenge after his opponent was endorsed by the former president Donald Trumpas voters in two other districts nominate candidates to fill two open seats in Virginia’s primary election Tuesday.
Rep. Bob Good, chairman of the far-right House Freedom Caucus, is seeking a third term representing Virginia’s 5th Congressional District, but argues that Sen. Sen. John McGuire has mounted a strong challenge that highlights the frictions within the party.
On the Democratic side, voters want to nominate candidates who can fill open seats vacated by popular incumbents Abigail Spanberger and Jennifer Wexton.
Statewide, voters will select a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate to face the Democrat Tim Kaine.
Here’s a look at the top battles on the ballot:
Huiswijk 5
Conventional politics might indicate that a congressman with Good’s conservative credentials would be safe in a primary. But he earned Trump’s wrath when he supported Florida’s government. Ron DeSantis as president. He switched back to Trump after DeSantis dropped out, but Trump is backing McGuire and portraying Good as conniving.
Trump continued to bash Good as he campaigned for McGuire during a phone call Monday night.
“Unlike Bob Good, John McGuire will not let you down,” Trump said, adding that McGuire is “strong on the border” and “will always defend your under-resourced Second Amendment.”
Good, for his part, says he considers Trump the best president of his lifetime and only supported DeSantis because Trump is constitutionally limited to just one more term.
Good also alienated Republican insiders by voting to impeach House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, plunging the party into a degree of chaos.
McGuire, a state lawmaker and former Navy SEAL who is trying to capitalize, has echoed Trump’s attacks on Good, calling him a “never Trumper.”
Good has portrayed McGuire as a serious campaigner who announced his bid for Congress just a week after winning election to a four-year term in the Senate.
If Good loses, he would be the first sitting House member to mount a primary challenge this year, with the exception of one race in which two incumbents faced off over redistricting.
The winner will face one of three Democrats: Gloria Tinsley Witt, Gary Terry or Paul Riley.
The 5th Congressional District extends from Charlottesville in the north, past the far western suburbs of Richmond, through Lynchburg and down to Danville and the North Carolina border.
Huiswijk 7
Spanberger is giving up the seat in Northern and Central Virginia to run for governor in 2025. The district leans slightly blue and seven Democrats are seeking the seat. Leading the field is political newcomer Eugene Vindman, a military veteran who gained some fame for his role in Trump’s first impeachment. Four current and former elected officials – Briana Sewell, Margaret Franklin, Andrea Bailey and Elizabeth Guzman – are also in the race.
On the Republican side, fundraising numbers indicate the top two contenders are Derrick Anderson and Cameron Hamilton. Anderson is a former Army Green Beret and Hamilton is a former Navy SEAL.
Huiswijk 10
Wexton is not seeking re-election to her seat in northern Virginia after being diagnosed with a rare, incurable neurological disease. The race to succeed her has drawn a field of 12 Democrats and four Republicans in a district that now leans Democratic.
Democratic candidates include former Virginia House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn, Secretary of State Dan Helmer, Suhas Subramanyam and Jennifer Boysko, and former Virginia Education Secretary Atif Qarni. Wexton has endorsed Subramanyam.
Republicans include Aliscia Andrews, who ran for the seat four years ago, and attorney Mike Clancy.
House district 2
In the congressional district that stretches along the Virginia coast, Missy Cotter Smasal and Jeremiah “Jake” Denton IV are vying for the Democratic nomination.
Smasal is a Navy veteran who runs a nonprofit organization that honors fallen service members. Denton is a constitutional and civil rights attorney who comes from a military family. Connection to the armed forces is often a calling card in the 2nd District, which is home to many veterans and several military installations and is adjacent to the nation’s largest Navy base in Norfolk.
The winner will face Congresswoman Jen Kiggans, a former Navy helicopter pilot and senator elected in 2022.
US Senate
Five Republicans are vying for a chance to unseat Kaine, a former governor and vice presidential candidate who is running unopposed for a third term in the Senate.
Hung Cao, a 25-year Navy veteran, has the most campaign money among the five GOP candidates and previous experience running for higher office. He also has the support of former President Donald Trump, who stated that Cao would help stop inflation, secure the border and defend the Second Amendment.
The other Republican primary candidates are Scott Parkinson, Jonathan Emord, Eddie Garcia and Chuck Smith.
Parkinson was a congressional staffer for DeSantis. He now works for the conservative economic policy group Club for Growth. Emord is an author and attorney who often cites his experience successfully fighting the Food and Drug Administration in court.
Garcia is a U.S. Army veteran and former Army liaison to Congress who owns a mobile app for military veterans. Smith is a Navy veteran, former commander of the Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps and an attorney.
Republicans say they smell political blood with President Joe Biden at the top of the list in November. But whoever runs against Kaine will face an uphill battle in a state that hasn’t sent a Republican to the U.S. Senate since 2002.
___
Finley contributed to this report from Norfolk.
