Harris triumphs over Trump in Virginia

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris attends a moderated conversation with former Trump administration national security official Olivia Troye and former Republican voter Amanda Stratton on July 17, 2024 in Kalamazoo, Michigan. (Photo by Chris duMond/Getty Images)

With 82% of votes counted at 11:44 p.m., the Associated Press has called the presidential contest in Virginia for Vice President Kamala Harris, giving her the state’s 13 Electoral College votes. 

Harris’ win continues a blue streak that began with Barack Obama’s win here in 2008. She garnered 51.3% of Virginia’s votes and won handily in the state’s large metro areas, carrying 56.26% in Northern Virginia’s Loudoun County, and 80.77% in Richmond and 70.67% in Norfolk down in Hampton Roads, according to the Virginia Department of Election’s unofficial results. 

Virginia has chosen Democratic candidates in the last four presidential elections: Obama earned 52.3% of Virginia’s votes in 2008; in 2012, 51.5% of Virginia voters helped re-elect Obama; Hilary Clinton won by 49.7% in the state in 2016; and Joe Biden swept the state with 54.1% of votes in 2020.

Harris prioritized reproductive health care access, gun reform, addressing inflation and expanding voting access during her months on the campaign trail. Her campaign launched a national reproductive health care bus tour in the final weeks before the election, which made several stops in Virginia, in Richmond, Virginia Beach and Northern Virginia. 

Republican former President Donal Trump focused on immigration, the economy, foreign policy issues including the Israel-Hamas war and Ukraine-Russia conflict, and election security during his reelection campaign, while facing mounting civil and criminal lawsuits. The most recent suit was lodged against Trump on Oct. 21 by the Central Park Five, five men who were exonerated in the rape and assault of a New York woman in the 1980s, for Trump’s false claims during the ABC News presidential debate in September that the group pled guilty to the crime and that someone was killed in connection to it. 

A former prosecutor, California attorney general and U.S. senator, Harris is the daughter of immigrant parents and the first woman to serve as America’s vice president, and the first Black and Asian person to be vice president.