Among the handful of so-called ‘battleground states’ in the last three presidential cycles, Virginia, with its 13 electoral college votes, has been hotly contested as a sine qua nonfor capturing the White House.
Since Democrats have continued enjoying an advantage in nearly every one of those states, winning Virginia has proved to be merely a feather in the electoral cap. Whereas, a victory in the Old Dominion is absolutely critical to the GOP’s winning strategy.
Despite that the states exploding population around the beltway has for decades continued to tilt the state leftward, Republican advances in last year’s mid-term wave have party officials confident that the right GOP candidate can turn Virginia red again.
Though he was massively outspent, Republican Ken Cuccinelli barely lost the election for governor in 2013. Then-political unknown Ed Gillespie came within a few thousand votes last fall of defeating popular incumbent Sen. Mark Warner.
