Political crisis in Virginia spreads to both parties
- by Jerome Frank
- in World News
- — Feb 8, 2019
The prospect of all three stepping down has raised the improbable scenario of the Democrats suddenly losing the governorship to a Republican without an election. Big League Politics also first published the racist photo in Northam's yearbook page.
Asked earlier this week about the allegations against Fairfax, a series of high-profile Democrats reiterated their call for Northam to resign but wouldn't engage on that possibility in regard to Fairfax. This was 24 hours after apologizing for appearing in the picture and after making the most frightful statement on "super" late term abortion.
As the top two Virginia officials tried to handle public relations nightmares, Attorney General Mark Herring - who would take over gubernatorial duties if both Northam and Fairfax were to resign - evidently looked at his fellow Democrats and said "hold my beer..."
A series of revelations over the past week have ensnared the governor and attorney general, both of whom admitted to wearing blackface while in college in the 1980s, and the lieutenant governor, accused of a 2004 sexual assault.
Then, under pressure from almost the entire state and national Democratic establishment to resign, he denied he was in the photo at all.
Northam has come under pressure from almost the entire Democratic establishment to resign after the discovery of a photo on his profile page in the Eastern Virginia Medical School yearbook of someone in blackface standing next to a person in a Ku Klux Klan hood and robe. In Northam's response to the picture, he admitted he had painted his face with shoe polish during an ill-conceived Michael Jackson impersonation. Herring, 57, who previously called for the governor to quit, is second in line to replace the governor and has expressed gubernatorial ambitions of his own.
"I am not either of the people in that photo", he said with his wife by his side.
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However, he's never been one to take such awards too seriously, and would rarely attend the ceremonies. It was one of the leading reps in the country". "I've always been lucky", he told the newspaper.
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Gov. Justin Fairfax, who has been accused of sexual assault by a woman named Venessa Tyson, hired the law firm that represented Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh back in September on Wednesday.
Fairfax has repeatedly denied Tyson's allegation, saying they only had a "consensual encounter". Explaining himself, Herring said he and his friends broke out the brown makeup and attended a party "dressed like rappers we listened to at the time, like Kurtis Blow".
"As one of seven working on a 359-page yearbook, I can not endorse or associate myself with every photo, entry, or word on each page", Norment wrote, adding that he did not appear in or take any of the photos in question.
"That conduct clearly shows that, as a young man, I had a callous and inexcusable lack of awareness and insensitivity to the pain my behaviour could inflict on others", he said.
"His shock at being so quickly discarded by the party has made it harder for Northam to accept the calls to resign", sources close to the governor told the Post.
That single game of chance allowed Republicans to hold a majority in the House of Delegates - and may now wipe out virtually all the gains of the 2017 Democratic sweep. Norment also said he had supported the academy's racial integration that year.
