Tag: virginia

Spanberger Rips Up Confederate Heritage To Separate Virginians From Their History

Seemingly not content to just destroy her state’s rule of law and election system, Democrat Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger has declared war on Virginia’s heritage and, more specifically, those who dedicate themselves to preserving it.

The newly minted governor signed a bill on Monday that revoked tax exemptions from several Confederate heritage organizations, including the state’s divisions of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC). Spanberger also recently signed a bill that ceases the production of specialty license plates bearing the likeness of Robert E. Lee.

“Governor Spanberger’s signing of this bill is a proud moment and an important step forward for Virginia,” state Delegate Alex Askew, who sponsored the bill and has campaigned for it for several years, stated. But the question is: A step forward toward what? A Virginia that hates its own history, that curses those men of the past who built the state and made it what it is today?

Spanberger’s signature represents, as The New York Times put it, part of “a yearslong Democrat-led push to shake off the state’s legacy as the capital of the 11 Southern, slaveholding states that seceded from the country in the 1860s.”

And indeed it has been a years-long campaign by the left to erase Virginia’s, and America’s, history. The era that began with the inauguration of President Barack Obama in 2009 and reached its fever pitch during the fiery George Floyd riots of summer 2020 saw the slow but sure disappearance of Confederate history from the public sphere. Even some Republican politicians found a convenient scapegoat in long-revered Southern symbols.

During a BLM riot in Richmond, Virginia, in May 2020, extremist agitators attacked the headquarters of the United Daughters of the Confederacy with “incendiary devices.” The building, deeded to the organization by the state in 1950, was filled with countless Civil War-era documents and artifacts. The resulting fire and destruction caused $4.1 million in damage to the building and its contents, according to a lawsuit filed by the UDC. The wanton vandalism that night also extended to the multiple Confederate monuments on Monument Avenue, including the famous equestrian statue of Robert E. Lee that was removed in 2021.

The UDC was founded by Southern women in 1894 to “honor their family members and ancestors who served in the Confederate military or contributed to the Southern war effort.” And because of this, Virginia’s Democrats seek to strike back for the sin of honoring their ancestors through charitable work. The new law is intended to cripple an organization that mostly dedicates itself these days to civic engagement of a decidedly nonpolitical sort — helping homeless shelters and food banks.

And, of course, the radical leftists didn’t stop at Confederate monuments. Statues and memorials to the Founding Fathers, Christopher Columbus, and Teddy Roosevelt all came under attack during the heyday of race wokeness. Many of the memorials and museums that escaped physical attack were otherwise “contextualized” into oblivion with asides and nitpicks that drilled into patrons’ heads that America’s ancestors were very bad people.

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School Board Strikes Veterans Day Which Is Outrageous, But the ‘Holiday’ They Kept Is Even More Infuriating

Fairfax County, Virginia, decided students should no longer get Veterans Day as a holiday.

However, Indigenous Peoples’ Day is one “holiday” they’ll gladly keep.

FFX Now reported on Monday that the county school board has arrived at their calendar for the next academic year, which reduced the number of early release days and omitted Veterans Day as a holiday.

Both Veterans Day and Indigenous Peoples’ Day were up for omission as holidays, but only the former passed.

Ostensibly, the decision came in response to parents’ concerns about disruptions to the school year.

Fairfax County’s board has not been a shining example for an educational body when looking at its history.

A Virginia mother, Stacey Langton, spoke out three years ago when Fairfax County included lewd LGBT-themed books in its libraries, exposing children to sexual content.

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Spanberger awards $5 MILLION to husband’s firm for Virginia Advanced Propulsion Facilities project

It has been revealed that Democrat Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger signed off on grants totaling $18 million to help a company where her husband works in expanding its operations in Orange County, $5 million of which will be awarded to the company directly. The grants will help build the Virginia Advanced Propulsion Facilities in Orange County.

L3Harris, an aerospace technology company as well as a defense contractor, had announced an over $1 billion expansion for solid rocket motor production capacity at the company’s site in Orange County. The grants are part of the project expansion.

“Governor Spanberger approved two grants of $12.5 million and $500,000 from the Commonwealth’s Opportunity Fund to assist Orange County with the projects. The Governor also approved a performance-based grant of $5 million from the Virginia Investment Performance Grant, an incentive that encourages continued capital investment by existing Virginia companies. Funding and services to support L3Harris’ employee training activities will be provided through the Virginia Jobs Investment Program,” a press release from Spanberger’s office said.

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Police Dispatch Audio Reveals Moments After Former Virginia Lt. Governor Justin Fairfax Kills His Wife and Himself

Horrifying dispatch audio of the 911 call that came in after Justin Fairfax and his wife died in a murder-suicide was released Thursday afternoon.

Former Virginia Lt. Governor Justin Fairfax shot and killed his wife, Cerina and then shot himself dead early Thursday morning.

According to NBC4 Washington, Justin Fairfax had just lost custody of his teenage children and was ordered to move out of the marital home before he murdered his wife and turned the gun on himself.

“The wife testified that heavy daily alcohol consumption by the father has become the norm,” a judge wrote in the custody opinion, the outlet reported.

“The court documents say Justin spiraled into alcoholism and isolated himself from family involvement following the 2019 sexual assault allegations against him while he was in office. They’re allegations he denied but that weighed on him tremendously, the judge wrote,” according to NBC 4 Washington.

Justin and Cerina’s two teenage children, a son and a daughter were home at the time of the bloody murder-suicide.

Fairfax’s 16-year-old son, Cameron dialed 911 and reported his mother had been shot.

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Radical Democrat Virginia Governor Signs Away the Commonwealth’s Electoral Votes to the National Popular Vote Scam – Democrats One Step Closer to Rigging the Presidency Forever

The radical left’s war on the American Republic just took a terrifying leap forward in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

On Tuesday, far-left Governor Abigail Spanberger officially signed legislation that would enter Virginia into the controversial National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC). This dangerous move effectively strikes a match to the U.S. Constitution.

Virginia becomes the 19th jurisdiction to join the compact, bringing the total to 222 electoral votes, just 48 shy of the 270 needed to activate the plan.

According to the League of Women Voters, “Six additional states with 65 electoral votes (Arizona, Michigan, New Hampshire, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin) are especially promising places for obtaining the 48 electoral votes needed before 2028.”

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‘Moderate’ Democrat Abigail Spanberger Signs Bill Forcing Virginia Schools To Consider ‘Restorative Disciplinary Practices’ Before Suspending Students

“Moderate” Virginia governor Abigail Spanberger signed a bill on Monday requiring public schools to consider “restorative disciplinary practices” like “peer mediation” or a “restorative circle” before suspending or expelling students, the Free Beacon’s Peter Hasson reports. The move follows controversial attempts to swap “exclusionary discipline”—what normal people call “discipline”—with “restorative justice” in liberal strongholds like New York City and Portland. It’s a far cry from the affordability-focused agenda on which the “centrist” Spanberger campaigned.

The bill states that “no public elementary or secondary school student shall be suspended, expelled, or excluded from attendance at school unless the school first considers at least one evidence-based restorative disciplinary practice.” Examples include “mentoring,” “a peer jury,” “peer mediation,” “a restorative circle,” and “any other disciplinary practice” that “provides solutions tailored to students’ cultures” and “includes community members reflecting the cultural and demographic diversity of the school community.” Though the bill does not detail how to organize a “restorative circle,” a guide from the left-wing Center for Justice Innovation says such circles are “rooted in centuries-old indigenous practices” and include an “opening ceremony” like a “breathing exercise” before “passing around an object that serves as the talking piece” which “gives the speaker a chance to share openly and uninterrupted.”

You won’t believe this, but after New York City, under former mayor Bill de Blasio, allocated millions of dollars toward “restorative justice” initiatives in schools, chronic absenteeism among city students rose to 34.8 percent in 2022-23 from 26.5 percent in 2018-19, while the number of incidents that required a response from the New York Police Department’s school safety division rose to 4,120 in the first quarter of 2025 from 1,200 in the first quarter of 2016. High-profile incidents exposing the pitfalls of the policy also emerged: In one case, a Jewish high school teacher in Brooklyn sued her district after students who subjected her to Nazi salutes and threats were sent to a “meditation room” rather than suspended.

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VA Executive Charged With Concealing Gifts and Cash Received from Government Contractors

In March, John H. Windom, 64, was federally indicted by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia on three counts: Concealment of Material Facts, False Statements, and Falsification of a Record or Document.

Windom, 64, a retired U.S. Navy Captain and former senior executive at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), served as Executive Director of the Office of Electronic Health Record Modernization (OEHRM) from 2017 to 2022.

In 2022, during the Biden administration, he was reassigned as deputy director of the Federal Electronic Health Modernization Office, a joint DoD-VA initiative.

According to the three-count Indictment, between 2017 and 2021, while Windom was leading the $16 billion acquisition and deployment of the VA’s Electronic Health Records solution, then one of the largest information technology contracts in the federal government, he concealed from the VA, executive branch ethics officials, and the public that he was also accepting, and sometimes demanding, extravagant gifts from a group of contractors and subcontractors who worked on the project he was overseeing.

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Virginia Governor Wants Amendments To Marijuana Sales Legalization Bill, Including Delayed Market Launch

Virginia’s governor is requesting that legislators make amendments to a bill to legalize recreational marijuana sales that they sent to her desk last month.

On Monday, Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D) returned the measure with suggested changes—including pushing back the launch date for sales to begin by six months, from January 1, 2027 to July 1, 2027.

The move will “allow for additional time to implement a legal market safely and curb the illicit market,” a press release from the governor’s office says.

“Five years ago, the Commonwealth took the first steps to legalize marijuana—and for five years, the work sat unfinished,” Spanberger said. “We are working to set up a marketplace that is controlled, regulated, and responsible—because legal markets only succeed when there are clear guardrails and enforcement to back it up.”

“To keep our next generation safe, we must also ensure real consequences for vape shops that have spent years targeting Virginia’s kids,” she said. “We need to rein in these shady businesses and make sure a legal marijuana market does not make the problem worse.”

Under current law, adults over 21 can legally possess up to 1 ounce of cannabis. The bill as approved by lawmakers would have increased that to 2.5 ounces, but Spanberger wants lawmakers to change that to 2 ounces.

The governor’s proposal will also “strengthen the enforcement provisions” in concert with a related bill lawmakers sent her on the issue “to put a greater focus on consumer and product safety,” her office’s press release said.

Spanberger is additionally proposing that the cannabis excise tax in the bill increase from 6 percent to 8 percent after July 1, 2029, and that regulators be allowed to license only up to 200 retail marijuana dispensaries prior to 2029 instead of the 350 included in the initial wave in the bill as passed by lawmakers.

The legislature is set to reconvene to address the governor’s proposal on April 22.

Meanwhile, Spanberger signed several other cannabis bills on Monday—including measures to protect the parental rights of consumers and allow patients to access medical marijuana in hospitals. She also proposed amendments to legislation to provide resentencing relief for people with past convictions and to change rules for marijuana delivery services.

Personal marijuana possession and home cultivation of marijuana has been legal in Virginia since 2021, but former Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) twice vetoed bills to provide consumers with a way to legally purchase regulated adult-use cannabis.

The marijuana sales bills that Spanberger wants amendments to are SB 542 from Sen. Lashrecse Aird (D) and HB 642 from Del. Paul Krizek (D).

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Virginia Governor Signs Law Banning ‘Ghost Guns’

Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger signed a bill to ban so-called “ghost guns,” another making it easier to sue gunmakers and sellers, and two other bills concerning possession of firearms by persons under court orders.

The bills – signed on April 10 – are among more than two dozen gun control and gun safety bills that the Virginia General Assembly sent to Spanberger after its regular session ended on March 24.

“Preventing gun violence is an issue of public safety – both for the officers who protect our streets and the children and families they work to keep safe,” the governor said in a statement.

Spanberger signed Senate Bill 323, which bans the manufacture, sale, and possession of firearms without serial numbers.

The new law also outlaws any gun that “after removal of all parts other than a major component, … is not detectable as a firearm when subjected to inspection by the types of detection devices, including X-ray machines, commonly used at airports, government buildings, schools, correctional facilities, and other locations for security screening.”

Senate Bill 27, which Spanberger also signed, sets standards of “responsible conduct” for firearm manufacturers, distributors, and retailers.

It calls for “reasonable controls” over the manufacture, sale, distribution, use, and marketing of firearm-related products.

It also allows the attorney general, local government attorneys, or private citizens to sue firearm businesses for injunctions, damages, and costs.

Spanberger also signed two bills concerning the possession of firearms by those under court orders.

According to Spanberger’s office, Senate Bill 160 closes an “intimate partner loophole” by prohibiting intimate partners convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence crimes from possessing a firearm.

The law adds to the definition of “family or household member,” an individual who, “within the previous 12 months, was in a romantic, dating, or sexual relationship with the person.”

Senate Bill 38 allows a person subject to a protective order or convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence and prohibited from possessing a firearm, to transfer their firearm to a person who is age 21 or older, who does not live in their home, and can legally own a gun.

These bills are the first of a slate of gun control and gun safety laws to be signed after the most recent session.

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Analysis: More Than 90 Percent Of Funds Backing Dems’ Gerrymandering Scheme Come From Outside Virginia

Democrats love to complain about big “dark money” donors trying to influence U.S. elections. But if their concerns were actually genuine, where is their outrage about the massive wave of out-of-state money flooding Virginia to pass their deceptively worded gerrymandering amendment?

According to figures compiled by the Virginia Public Access Project (VPAP), the wrongly named “Virginians for Fair Elections” has received nearly $50 million to deceive voters into supporting a legally questionable ballot measure allowing the state’s Democrat-run General Assembly to redraw the commonwealth’s congressional map. The party’s current proposal would gerrymander the state’s U.S. House districts from a six Democrat-five Republican map to a 10 Democrat-one Republican map and effectively disenfranchise millions of rural Virginians in the process.

In the months leading up to the April 21 referendum, Virginians for Fair Elections has deployed dishonest ads characterizing Democrats’ gerrymandering scheme as “fair,” and claiming it’s about protecting “democracy,” a much-needed “emergency,” and “level[ing] the playing field.” But it’s clear after examining the funds being poured into the group, however, that most of its financial support isn’t coming from the Virginians it pretends it’s trying to help, but from leftist organizations based outside the state.

A Federalist analysis of the latest donation figures assembled by the Virginia Public Access Project shows that more than 90 percent of Virginians for Fair Elections’ large contributions come from Democrat-aligned out-of-state groups.

The organization’s largest contributor is none other than the D.C.-based House Majority Forward (HMF), a 501(c)(4) that boasts ties to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and House Democrat leadership. According to InfluenceWatch, HMF — which has given $29.3 million to Virginians for Fair Elections — “focuses on climate change, social justice, economics, and democracy, and produces ads in favor of Democratic candidates and opposed to Republican candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives.”

The second largest donor ($11.02 million) to Virginians for Fair Elections is The Fairness Project. InfluenceWatch describes the D.C.-based 501(c)(4) as a “labor union-backed advocacy organization that finances and supports state ballot initiative campaigns to promote left-of-center policies such as government-mandated comprehensive paid family and medical leave, Medicaid expansion, and minimum wage increases.”

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