A Democratic group promoting veterans running for office is sending $500,000 to Abigail Spanberger in support of her run in this year’s Virginia governor’s race, pointing to the former C.I.A. officer as the type of candidate who can help the Democratic Party return to power.
The direct donation is the largest in the 20-year history of the group, VoteVets, and appears to be the largest to date for Ms. Spanberger, a former member of Congress who opted against running for re-election in 2024 to pursue the governorship. There are no limits on campaign contributions in Virginia state elections.
Ms. Spanberger, 45, is considered the favorite to win the Democratic nomination, with no other top-tier Democrat so far in the race. She is expected to face the state’s Republican lieutenant governor, Winsome Earle-Sears, 60 and a Marine veteran herself. The contest, along with a race for governor in New Jersey, will be closely watched this fall for signs of the nation’s political direction 10 months into President Trump’s second term.
“We know that investing in candidates like Abigail is key to Democrats’ success,” VoteVets wrote in a memo provided to The New York Times, noting that 600,000 veterans and 120,000 active-duty service members live in Virginia.
A Mason-Dixon poll released last month showed Ms. Earle-Sears narrowly behind Ms. Spanberger, 44 percent to 47 percent, and slightly ahead of Representative Bobby Scott, Democrat of Virginia, 46 percent to 44 percent.
Mr. Scott has not ruled out a run, but he has not sounded like a candidate of late, telling a local reporter this month that Mr. Trump is “keeping me too busy in Washington right now.”
Ms. Spanberger ended last year with $6.5 million in the bank, and Ms. Earle-Sears had $2.1 million, records show. The race is expected to cost far more than that.
Ms. Spanberger flipped a Republican-held congressional seat in 2018, part of a class of moderate Democrats who helped take the House in a Democratic landslide. She used her history as a covert C.I.A. officer overseas to appeal to voters in a district that included the suburbs of Richmond, Va., and parts of exurban Washington.
During the Biden years, she cautioned her party against overreaching, especially after Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, won the Virginia governorship in 2021.
“Nobody elected him to be F.D.R.,” she said of President Joseph R. Biden Jr. at the time, urging him to temper his sweeping agenda. “They elected him to be normal and stop the chaos.”
In its memo, VoteVets, which spent roughly $30 million during the 2024 elections, noted that a number of Democratic candidates with national security credentials won key races last year, including Senators Elissa Slotkin of Michigan and Ruben Gallego of Arizona, both of whom succeeded in states that Mr. Trump carried.
“We understand greatly the need to recruit and build up a roster of veteran and military candidates to retake the House and Senate,” the group wrote.
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