Yancey: Cao “is repeatedly showing himself to be astonishingly out of touch with the cultural and geographic realities of the state he wants to represent.”
Richmond, VA – After calling a Staunton newspaper “podunk” and claiming that traveling from Northern Virginia to Abingdon for a forum would be “ridonkulous,” Hung Cao once again shows that he doesn’t know anything about Virginia by claiming that anything South of Loudoun and Fairfax Counties is “Southern Virginia.”
In his latest column, Yancy notes Cao “seems culturally unaware, as if anything south of Loudoun and Fairfax is as foreign to him as, well, as foreign as Northern Virginia is to me. This opens him up to the same type of attacks from Democrats that Republicans usually level at Democrats — elitism.”
And Yancey asks the important question everyone is wondering: “I’m reminded of the old story about how you stop someone who’s in a hole from getting in deeper: Stop digging. Will someone please take the shovel away from Cao?”
“Hung Cao continues to find new ways to show his elitism to Virginians – first he called a Staunton newspaper ‘podunk,’ then he said it would be ‘ridonkulous’ to drive to Abingdon and listen to Virginians, and now he thinks anything South of Loudon and Fairfax is ‘Southern Virginia.’ Maybe if Hung Cao spent time talking to Virginians instead of hiding he would know more about the Commonwealth,” said Michael Beyer, Communications Director for Senator Kaine.
Read more below:
Cardinal News: Senate candidate Cao says that anything south of Loudoun and Fairfax is ‘Southern Virginia’
Dwayne Yancey
July 19, 2024
- When I was growing up on a farm in the Shenandoah Valley, my father once had to deliver a truckload of something to Northern Virginia. What I remember most was that on the way back we stopped at a McDonald’s in Manassas and in the restroom I overheard two teenage boys marveling that they’d never been so far out in the country before.
- I was both amused and aghast — here I thought I was in the big city!
- That memory came to mind when I heard what Senate Republican candidate Hung Cao said this week on “The Brian Kilmeade Show” on Fox. Cao explained that he intended to upset the incumbent, Democrat Tim Kaine, by holding tight to Donald Trump’s coattails:
- “Well, President Trump is loved in Southern Virginia. When I say Southern Virginia, I’m talking about Rappahannock, Prince William and Fauquier counties down. That’s not very deep. That’s an hour out of D.C. And everybody loves him down there. And that’s why he’s gonna carry the day in Virginia. I’m gonna be there with him.”
- What clanks in my ear instead — and perhaps some of yours — is Cao’s description of anything south of Fairfax and Loudoun counties as “Southern Virginia.”
- Dude, no.
- Keep in mind that Cao now has a history of saying unfortunate things about places outside of Northern Virginia. During the primary, he blasted a story about himself in the Staunton News Leader by calling it a “podunk local newspaper.” He may have thought his fire was trained simply on the newspaper, but to call anything in a small city “podunk” spreads that insult around. In some ways the more offensive word there was “local” as if something “local” is somehow not as important as something bigger. Cao followed that up with a clearer offense, when he said Abingdon was too far to drive for a campaign forum, that such a trip would be, in his memorable word, “ridonkulous.”
- I’m reminded of the old story about how you stop someone who’s in a hole from getting in deeper: Stop digging. Will someone please take the shovel away from Cao?
- This reference to how Rappahannock, Prince William and Fauquier counties are “Southern Virginia” is on the same order of magnitude as when Maurice Dawkins, the sacrificial Republican candidate for U.S. Senate against Charles Robb in 1988, said he’d been to Southwest Virginia because he’d recently been in Charlottesville.
- I’m sure Cao thinks I’m criticizing him, but I’m actually trying to help him. He is repeatedly showing himself to be astonishingly out of touch with the cultural and geographic realities of the state he wants to represent.
- If Cao goes on to lose, none of this matters. Someday we can all sit around and tell tales — remember that time some candidate said that Fauquier and Prince William counties were in “Southern Virginia”? Har har har. What was that guy’s name anyway?
- Let’s start here: Cao lives in Northern Virginia. Not just Northern Virginia, but Loudoun County. He may like to say he lives in the “small town” — his words — of Purcellville. It’s a lovely place, and Purcellville in the less developed northwestern part of the county certainly isn’t Dulles. However, it’s still in Loudoun County, the most affluent county in the country. As a resident of Loudoun County, Cao rightly sees those distinctions, but down here in my part of the state, people don’t. Just as we’re all “Southern Virginia” to him, what’s up there somewhere is all “Northern Virginia” to us.
- Here’s why this matters, and I’ll try to be gentle: People in Southwest and Southside Virginia don’t particularly like Northern Virginia. Or trust politicians from there.
- Cao may think that’s not him — he’s certainly not liberal — but he’s got to be wary of its cultural context, nonetheless. If some Northern Virginia Democrat had disparaged the Staunton paper as a “podunk local newspaper,” said Abingdon was too far to drive and then called everything south of Loudoun and Fairfax “Southern Virginia,” Republicans would have crucified the candidate — except they’d have to fight me off, because I’d have wanted to do the job first. (When I was editorial page editor for The Roanoke Times, I singed one Democratic legislator from Northern Virginia for some comments he made about Lee County).
- The basic assumption in rural Virginia is to be distrustful of politicians from Northern Virginia on the theory that they don’t really understand us and probably look down on us. A few years ago, a visiting Democratic politician from Northern Virginia asked if there was a Metro system connecting the Roanoke and New River valleys. That struck some as just par for the course — see how little those Northern Virginians really know about us? At least Democrats aren’t counting on many votes from the western part of the state. Somehow, though, we now have the amazing spectacle of a Republican candidate from Northern Virginia coming across culturally tone-deaf about his own party’s political base.
- Cao may be politically in touch with all those rural Republican voters. He seems to have the “right” positions, in terms of being properly conservative enough for all the deep red localities of rural Virginia, but he seems culturally unaware, as if anything south of Loudoun and Fairfax is as foreign to him as, well, as foreign as Northern Virginia is to me. This opens him up to the same type of attacks from Democrats that Republicans usually level at Democrats — elitism.
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