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Accessibility statementSkip to main content Democracy Dies in Darkness SubscribeSign in Democracy Dies in Darkness Virginia PoliticsLocal newsD.C. politicsMd. politics Virginia PoliticsLocal newsD.C. politicsMd. politics FOUR CENTURIES IN, VIRGINIA COULD BE ON TRACK FOR ITS FIRST FEMALE GOVERNOR The anticipated matchup between Rep. Abigail Spanberger and Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears would be a first for Virginia and the nation’s 11th woman vs. woman contest for governor. December 1, 2024 8 min New! Catch up quickly with key takeaways Close alert banner 243 Virginia Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears (R) and Rep. Abigail Spanberger (D-Virginia) are running for governor next year. (Kristen Zeis for The Washington Post; Robb Hill for The Washington Post) By Laura Vozzella RICHMOND — All 74 of Virginia’s elected governors have had one thing in common, be they slave-owner or civil rights champion, farmer or global business titan, Pat Robertson pal or man about town. From Patrick Henry to Glenn Youngkin, each one has been a man. The same goes for the colonial governors before them. Subscribe for unlimited access to The Post Save up to 90% for a limited time. Get your first year for 99¢ every four weeks That’s on track to change, as two women seem to have cleared the field for next year’s Republican and Democratic gubernatorial primaries. Rep. Abigail Spanberger has had the Democratic contest to herself since her lone competitor dropped out in April, while Winsome Earle-Sears’s long-anticipated rival for the GOP nod let it be known this month that he was taking a pass. Story continues below advertisement While someone else could still jump into either of the June primaries, politicos throughout the state and beyond widely expect to see Spanberger and Earle-Sears atop the ballot on Nov. 4, in a history-making contest for the Old Dominion’s Executive Mansion. Advertisement “To see two women major-party candidates for a very high-profile governor’s race is, in and of itself, a big sign of progress in this country,” said Amanda Hunter, former executive director of the Barbara Lee Family Foundation, which for 25 years studied women running for executive office on both sides of the aisle. Skip to end of carousel MAKE THE MOST OF THE DMV WITH OUR NEWSLETTER (The Washington Post) Make living in D.C. a little easier and more fun. Sign up for the Post Local newsletter to get local news, weather and expert advice — where to eat, where to drink and how to get around — every weekday. End of carousel While Republican Kelly Ayotte and Democrat Joyce Craig squared off for New Hampshire governor this year, it is highly unusual for both major-party candidates for governor to be women. That has been the case only 10 times in American history, according to the Center for American Women in Politics (CAWP) at Rutgers University. Story continues below advertisement Spanberger vs. Earle-Sears would be number 11. 🏛️ Follow Politics Follow “It is extraordinarily difficult for a woman to be elected as an executive. And it seems like the best way is when two women run against each other, which is rare,” said Republican pollster Amanda Iovino, executive director of the Virginia Conservative Women’s Coalition. Advertisement Over the nation’s history, 49 women have been governor in 32 states. Women hold that post in a record 12 states. That number will tick up to 14 in January, but only temporarily by CAWP’s count, as Ayotte takes office in New Hampshire and Delaware Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long (D) fills a two-week gap between her state’s outgoing and incoming male governors, and South Dakota Gov. Kristi L. Noem (R) then steps down to join President-elect Donald Trump’s Cabinet, as looks likely. Story continues below advertisement Women have had a far easier time winning seats in state legislatures and Congress than executive roles like governorships and the still-elusive presidency, said CAWP director Debbie Walsh. “Especially when you’re running for a chief executive position … the question is, ‘Will this woman be strong enough and tough enough?’” she said. “The stereotypes about women’s leadership is they do well in committees. Legislative work fits into that. But being the executive, where the buck stops, is different.” Advertisement The women running for Virginia governor have résumés that defy those stereotypes. Spanberger handled and recruited spies overseas as a CIA officer. Earle-Sears served in the Marines. Story continues below advertisement “Both of these women have very nontraditional backgrounds, and I don’t think that’s accidental,” said Democratic pollster and strategist Celinda Lake. “That communicates a certain decisiveness, a certain toughness that often women have trouble conveying.” At least so far, neither Spanberger nor Earle-Sears has leaned into the barrier-breaking nature of their quests, which in the lieutenant governor’s case would be twofold: A Jamaican immigrant, Earle-Sears would be the nation’s first Black woman governor. “I could have never believed growing up that I could be asking Virginians for their faith and confidence in me to serve them as governor of our great Commonwealth,” Earle-Sears, whose campaign declined to comment for this article, said at her September campaign kickoff. “Yes, this is an opportunity to make history, but our campaign is about making life better for every Virginian right here, right now.” Advertisement Story continues below advertisement Spanberger’s campaign struck a similar note. “Abigail believes that this campaign, while historic for the Commonwealth, will ultimately come down to the contrast on the issues between Abigail and her eventual opponent — as well as the contrast on their approach,” Spanberger campaign spokesman Connor Joseph said in a written statement to The Washington Post. Similarly, Vice President Kamala Harris did not play up the history-making prospects of her presidential bid — a departure from the way Democrat Hillary Clinton took aim at what she called that “highest, hardest glass ceiling.” “We saw Vice President Harris really didn’t talk about gender that much. And it didn’t mean it wasn’t on voters’ minds,” said Karen Finney, a senior adviser to Clinton in 2016 and to Democrat Stacey Abrams in her unsuccessful 2018 bid for Georgia governor. “It will be interesting to see how these two women — they both have unique elements in their backgrounds — how they present themselves to the electorate.” Advertisement Story continues below advertisement As lieutenant governor, Earle-Sears is only the second woman elected statewide in Virginia, behind Mary Sue Terry, who won two races for state attorney general before stepping down in 1993 to run for governor against Republican George Allen. Terry’s status as a woman who had never married or had children became an issue in the campaign, which she eventually lost to Allen in a landslide. The governor’s mansion should not be a “cold, stone, sterile building … [but] a home for a man and a woman, where you can hear the laughter of children,” Oliver North, a staunch conservative notorious for his role in the 1980s Iran-contra affair, declared as he campaigned for Allen in October 1993. A whisper campaign about Terry’s sexuality made its way to TV news, with Roanoke’s Channel 10 asking voters on the street whether they would support Terry if she were a lesbian. (Terry says now, as then, that she’s heterosexual.) As a young political scientist in 1993, Mark J. Rozell studied news coverage of the Terry-Allen race for signs of bias. Now dean of George Mason University’s Schar School of Policy and Government, he sees a big difference in the looming matchup between Spanberger and Earle-Sears. Advertisement Story continues below advertisement “Nobody is asking the question whether Virginia is ready for a woman to be its governor,” he said. The question Rozell hears this time around comes from Democrats still parsing November’s muddled presidential results. (Trump lost the state by 5.8 points, but outperformed his 10-point 2020 blowout, with Democratic turnout dipping and Trump making gains with some minorities.) “They’re asking whether a politically moderate, bipartisan woman who opposed Nancy Pelosi [for speaker of the House] is going to drive up the enthusiasm of the progressive wing of the party,” he said, referring to Spanberger. “That’s their worry, not [her] gender.” Terry thinks the climate for women running for governor — and president, for that matter — has come a long way since her race, even after a White House contest that improbably focused at times on “childless cat ladies” and Arnold Palmer’s genitalia. Advertisement Story continues below advertisement “Times have changed and changed for the better,” Terry said. She thinks there is less “overt sexism” today — though “still people who aren’t as comfortable with a woman [for chief executive] as they might be as with a man. … It will be interesting to see how that plays out with the two women.” Woman vs. woman races are no guarantee that gender bias is off the table, according to research the Barbara Lee Family Foundation conducted with Lake. “We always assumed if we had two women running, it would cancel out gender bias. We actually found it would amplify gender bias in some categories,” said Hunter, the former executive director of the foundation, which is closing its doors. Even in races between women, female candidates face outsize scrutiny of their hair, wardrobe and tone of voice, the research found. Women must demonstrate competence and likability to voters, who will settle for competence alone from male office-seekers. Women also pay a higher price with voters for “going negative” against opponents, leading some female candidates to let outside groups deliver those blows. Advertisement Voters “still hold women to a higher standard than men — even with no men in the race,” reads a 2022 foundation report, “Shared Hurdles: How Political Races Change When Two Women Compete.” Yet for those who would like to see more women in executive office, woman vs. woman races have one undisputed upside: “A woman has to win,” notes Lake, who has begun working on a book with Finney and Iovino about what it will take to elect a female president. “In those places where it’s hard to break in … having women-women races is a great way to break through this glass ceiling,” Lake said. “Honestly, I think this is one of the major strategies to get a woman elected president in 2028.” Share 243 Comments More coverage of Virginia HAND CURATED * Four centuries in, Virginia could be on track for its first female governor December 1, 2024 * To oppose racism, a priest won’t lead Communion. He could be defrocked. November 29, 2024 * At their annual ‘turkey twerk,’ dancers wobble before they gobble November 28, 2024 View 3 more storiesView 3 more stories NewsletterWeekdays Post Local The news you need about the place you call home. News, weather and lifestyle for D.C., Maryland and Virginia. Sign up PAID PROMOTED STORIES Subscribe to comment and get the full experience. Choose your plan → Advertisement Advertisement Advertisement Company About The Post Newsroom Policies & Standards Diversity & Inclusion Careers Media & Community Relations WP Creative Group Accessibility Statement Sections Trending Politics Elections Opinions National World Style Sports Business Climate Well+Being D.C., Md., & Va. 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