Democrat Terry McAuliffe declined to formally concede defeat in the Virginia gubernatorial race Tuesday night, despite trailing Republican Glenn Youngkin by more than 100,000 votes with most precincts reported.
“We still got a lot of votes to count, we got about 18 percent of the vote out, so we’re gonna continue to count the votes because every single Virginian deserves to have their vote counted,” McAuliffe told cheering supporters in the suburban outpost of Tysons Corner, at around 10:20 p.m.
Moments later, McAuliffe tweeted a statement that echoed his earlier remarks:
“Folks, not everything is counted and we’re still waiting for a lot of votes to come in. And we want to ensure every Virginians’ voice is heard.
“To all my supporters across Virginia who knocked doors, made phone calls, and talked to their neighbors: I am eternally grateful.”
“We know that the long term path of Virginia is toward inclusion and openness and tolerance. We can and will never stop fighting for those values that we believe in.”
Youngkin’s lead shrank as heavily Democratic counties in northern Virginia reported outstanding votes, but ultimately McAuliffe could not make up enough ground to overtake his opponent.
Multiple news outlets called the race for Youngkin shortly before 1 a.m. Wednesday and the Republican candidate delivered a victory speech moments later. However, there was still no direct admission from McAuliffe that he had lost.
Earlier in the evening, the former Virginia governor had tamped down expectations for his supporters in a brief, sober message.
CNN correspondent Jeff Zeleny tweeted as the votes were being counted that McAuliffe, who had opted to watch the returns at home rather than at his Election Night party, told his backers: “When the results of this election come in — win or lose — we can rest assured that we did everything we can to create the future that we want.”
The borderline-consoling message raised eyebrows on social media.
“McAuliffe finally makes a smart campaign decision by avoiding his donors on election night,” tweeted former Mike Pence campaign spokesman Jon Thompson.
“Really not what you do if you think you’re going to win,” tweeted liberal attorney Ethan Bearman.
McAuliffe reassured voters “not everything is counted” as the race with opponent Glenn Youngkin is close. AP“[T]he ‘watching from home’ bit is brutal,” chimed in Republican operative Logan Dobson.
As results poured in showing Youngkin taking a clear lead in the commonwealth, the McAuliffe campaign kept a low profile. At one point during NBC News’ coverage, “Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd noted, “we’ve had a few McAuliffe surrogates that we expected to be on our air that suddenly are not available.”
McAuliffe had a tumultuous relationship with the media during his campaign. On Oct. 19, he cut short a sitdown with WJLA-TV and upbraided the reporter by saying: “You should have asked better questions early on.”
The former head of the Democratic National Committee also has a history of not admitting defeat. McAuliffe gained notoriety at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston when he told delegates: “We actually won the last presidential election, folks. They stole the last presidential election.”
When confronted with that claim during an interview with a Virginia TV station last month, McAuliffe refused to say whether George W. Bush had been “legitimately elected” president in 2000, saying only: “He got sworn in. Once you’re sworn in, we’ve gotta move on.”
