As AFN has reported, Abigail Spanberger (pictured above) recently pledged that if she is elected governor of Virginia, one of her first acts would be to undo Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin's executive order directing state and local law enforcement agencies to assist the federal immigration crackdowns implemented by Donald Trump.
Spanberger argues the policy wastes local resources and undermines community trust. She says immigration enforcement should be handled by federal officials with judicial oversight, not by local police diverted from their own duties.
That does not surprise Eric Ruark, director of policy for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), but he thinks she should reconsider.
"Obviously, Spanberger's a Democrat and so for whatever reason thinks that this is a winning issue for her," he notes. "I would argue that this is very much something that even voters within her party, many of them would oppose."
He says a nearby example of that is Washington, D.C., where residents overwhelmingly vote Democrat but have supported Trump's crackdown on illegal immigration.
"I don't think it serves her well politically, but … if she's going to raise money as a Democrat, that's really toeing the party line there to try to shore up support," Ruark concludes.
Spanberger's stance is a sharp contrast to her opponent's — Republican nominee Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears, who supports and embraces Youngkin's order and ties it to her own story as a legal immigrant from Jamaica.
Virginia is the only state that limits its governor to a single term.
