The hottest primary in Virginia

Primaries in Virginia used to be a bore, but no longer.

Last year, Dave Brat’s tea-party-backed insurgency against the seemingly impregnable House Minority Leader Eric Cantor garnered national headlines in Virginia’s 7^th Congressional District.

This year, you have several General Assembly races come June 9 that will seek to replace several prominent politicians who are retiring, including Republicans John Watkins of the 10^th Senate District, Walter Stosch of the 12^th Senate District and Democrat Charles Colgan of the 29^th.

I picked the 10^th District race for a piece in Style Weekly. There, historic tax credit developer Dan Gecker, a long time Chesterfield County planning commissioner and supervisor, is up against progressive non-profit consultant Emily Francis and former delegate and lawyer Alex McMurtrie for the Democrat candidacy. Whoever wins faces Republican nominee Glen Sturtevant and Libertarian Carl Loser.

The race could well determine whether the state senate remains in Republican hands. Should the Democrat win, the mix in the Senate could bounce back to 20-20; it is 21-19 now in favor of the GOP. Stephen Farnsworth, a political analyst at the University of Mary Washington,  told me this is the race to watch.

[Continue reading Peter Galuszka’s post at Bacon’s Rebellion.]

Peter Galuszka blogs at Bacon’s Rebellion. The Local Blog Network is a group of bloggers from around the D.C. region who have agreed to make regular contributions to All Opinions Are Local.