By Colby Johnson
BUENA VISTA, Va. (WDBJ) – Monday marked the 54th annual Labor Day Parade in Buena Vista and the unofficial start of Virginia’s election season.
Candidates from all the major statewide races participated in the parade, as did a number of candidates from local races.
During the event, WDBJ7 spoke with both candidates for governor, Abigail Spanberger and Winsome Earle-Sears, about their platforms and how they say their policies will support our hometowns.
“What they’re paying for electrical rates, we’ve got to fix that. It can’t be that the people of the Southwest, especially, are trying to figure out whether or not they’re going to pay for their groceries or their rent, or their electric bill. It can’t be that way; something’s got to give, and I’m the person to fight for the people of the Southwest. On that they can depend,” said Lt. Governor Winsome Earle-Sears, the Republican candidate for governor.
Earle-Sears also highlighted her plan to eliminate Virginia’s car tax and said that she and Governor Glenn Youngkin have been a voice for Southwest Virginia.
“Southwest folks think that no one cares. So we’ve made sure, the governor, myself, and the attorney general, we’ve been down in the southwest,” said Earle-Sears. “I am going to put a governor’s office in the southwest, because half of life is showing up. That’s one way to show that we care is to be among the people of the southwest.”
Spanberger, a former Virginia U.S. Representative, said the biggest concern she hears about in Southwest Virginia and across the state is affordability. She said she has a plan to address this.
“I have already rolled out an affordability agenda in housing, healthcare, and energy. I’ve rolled out a strengthening our schools plan for early childhood education, K-12, as well as for our universities and community colleges, and our growing Virginia’s Economy Plan focused on strengthening our workforce and bringing investment to Virginia,” said Spanberger, the Democratic candidate for governor.
Spanberger also talked about her plans to support rural healthcare in the state amid possible changes at the federal level following the passage of the Big Beautiful Bill.
“We know that per the bill that was signed into law, more than 300,000 Virginians will likely lose their healthcare. We know that six to seven rural hospitals will shut down. Because of some of the changes that they’ve made to the way funding mechanisms will go, over a course of 14 years, it’s a loss of $26 billion to Virginia hospitals,” she said. “The impact will be dire, but I’m looking at every opportunity that we have to strengthen the delivery of services through Medicaid, but also to work directly with our hospital systems to ensure that in any mechanism we possibly can create, we are ensuring we can provide care to people across communities.”
One way or another, Virginia will have its first female Governor come next year. Both candidates argued they’re the right woman for the job by touting their resumes, Sears as the current Lieutenant Governor, and Spanberger as a Congresswoman.
“This is about continuing the great successes that we’ve had. We must continue to keep taxes low because that’s what the people of Virginia want. They know best how to get the best from their hard-earned money, and they want to make sure we get crime continuing to go down. We’re going to make sure we don’t defund the police and we don’t get rid of their qualified immunity,” said Earle-Sears. “An economy is a good economy when it works for everybody. We’ve been doing the work, and we know how to do this.”
Spanberger pitched herself as a bipartisan leader who can build coalitions across party lines.
“During my whole time in Congress, I was every year ranked as the most bipartisan member of Congress from Virginia. I was also ranked as the most effective legislator in the House of Representatives or the Senate on issues of agriculture,” said Spanberger.
Both candidates celebrated the day’s events.
“It’s awesome. You get to walk in a parade, speak your mind, and live to see another day. This is wonderful. America is such a great country. I’m an immigrant to this great nation, and we don’t get this in other nations. We can’t afford to lose this, even if you don’t agree,” said Earle-Sears.
Spanberger said she was also grateful to be a part of the parade’s tradition.
“Buena Vista has always said we’re going to welcome people to the community, welcome you to march in the parade, welcome you to speak to local voters, so it’s a celebration. It’s an opportunity to speak directly to voters and speak to the issues, but importantly, it’s an opportunity to be part of a community event that is at this point decades-long,” she said.
Both parties’ candidates for Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General were also in the parade, John Reid and incumbent Attorney General Jason Miyares on the Republican side, and Ghazala Hashmi and Jay Jones on the Democratic side.