More eyes are on Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin as he touts an impressive fundraising haul and prepares to travel across the country to stump for Republican candidates. The two moves are considered key signals the newly elected governor could be considering a potential 2024 run for president.
According to The Washington Examiner:
Youngkin raised $2.64 million into his political action committee, Spirit of Virginia, a state-regulated PAC without contribution limits, from Jan. 1 through June 30, according to figures shared with the Washington Examiner. The governor’s haul more than doubled what his three immediate predecessors raised during their first six months in office and reveals a chief executive not content to return to private life after concluding the single, four-year term afforded to him under Virginia’s constitution.
The resources Youngkin is raising into Spirit of Virginia and his relatively new federal political nonprofit group, America’s Spirit, are going toward building a political operation dedicated to expanding the governor’s footprint and influence, beyond the Old Dominion, as he considers a 2024 run for the White House. That effort is taking shape in the form of accelerated travel to states, red and blue, to boost Republican candidates requesting his assistance.
Indeed, Youngkin’s planned travel, the extent of which his political advisers are temporarily keeping under wraps, is intended to show his unique versatility on the national stage: At home, in GOP strongholds, where former President Donald Trump and his brand of conservative populism are popular but also welcome in suburban communities and swing states, where traditional Republicans and independents who take a dim view of the former president predominate.
Some party insiders believe Youngkin could be the key to assembling a coalition that would be unbeatable in 2024. Youngkin is mulling higher office in part because he is prohibited from running for reelection in 2025.
Virginia allows governors to serve multiple term just not consecutively.
“As soon as it became clear that Youngkin would win a governor’s race by threading the needle between Trump voters and mainstream suburban voters, he became a viable candidate for president,” said Jim Dornan, a Republican strategist in Washington. “His exploring that possibility doesn’t surprise me at all.”
