MASKS OFF: Top Virginia Dem Depicts Jay Jones Assaulting Opponent, Lashes Out At ‘Snitch’

In the weeks before the election, Virginia Democrats told voters that they condemned political violence and that Jay Jones was remorseful about his desire to shoot a Republican.

But hours after they won, their tune changed. Louise Lucas, the president pro tempore of the Virginia state Senate, appeared to suggest that she wasn’t angry with Jones for making the comments so much as she was angry that Virginians found out thanks to a “snitch.”

“Virginia is for lovers, not snitches,” she posted on social media, alongside an artificial intelligence-generated video showing Jones kicking his opponent, Jason Miyares, who was depicted as a dog.

The “snitch” comment appeared to be a reference to Carrie Coyner, a Republican delegate who Jones sent his murderous texts to, and who confirmed their authenticity to the National Review for a story that upended the election.

Coyner, the most moderate member of either chamber, was subject to a vicious campaign accusing her of “betrayal” by Don Scott, a Democrat who replaced Todd Gilbert – the man Jones wanted to shoot in the head – as House Speaker.

Scott is a convicted crack dealer, while Lucas operates a marijuana shop. The “snitch” meme was also reposted by Sen. Lashrecse Aird. All are members of the state’s Black Caucus, as is Jones. The “snitches” meme echoes the phrase “snitches get stitches,” a phrase used by inner city thugs to describe their practice of assaulting people who speak to the police.

The characterization implies that many people knew about Jones’s desire for political violence, but kept their mouths closed until Coyner, as Scott said from the pulpit of a black church and in a campaign ad, “betrayed” them.

Virginia House Speaker Don Scott and Jay Jones (Max Posner for The Washington Post; Trevor Metcalfe/The Virginian-Pilot/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

The idea that Democrats were functioning with a Mafia-like code of omertà would also implicate Governor-elect Abigail Spanberger, who, at a debate, blamed the Jones scandal on Republicans who “held them for years so the public was unaware who had knowledge of these text messages,” implying she had no way of knowing about his tendencies until the primary had already concluded. But it would stand to reason that Jones would not conceal his hatred of Republicans from his fellow Democrats, yet be open about it with Republicans themselves.

After the National Review’s October 4 story showing that Jones wanted to put two bullets in the head of the Republican speaker and watch his children die, Democrats refused to disavow Jones, while saying that they opposed his rhetoric. After the assassination of Charlie Kirk and the attempted assassinations of President Donald Trump, being tied to such rhetoric seemed like a political liability. But Jones won with 53% of the vote, only 2.5% behind the Democrat candidate for lieutenant governor, suggesting there might be little penalty among Democrat voters after all. The “snitches” comment wasn’t the only way that showed.

On October 30, the campaign bus of Republican gubernatorial candidate Winsome Sears caught fire, and Lucas said, “I’m glad to hear no one was hurt.” As soon as Virginians cast their votes, her tune changed: She posted a doctored photo of herself standing by the bus.

Lucas also echoed, rather than repudiated, violent political imagery after the election by reposting a comment that Lucas “planted that foot in [Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s] ass and ended his career.”

Lucas also reposted a comment calling her “ruthless,” and said she intends to redistrict the state (where Republican candidates received 43%, 45%, and 47% of the vote on Tuesday) has only a single Republican in Congress.

That would involve a similarly ruthless move. Democrats enacted a 45-day early voting period, which caused some people to vote before learning about Jones’ support for violence. But for purposes of amending the Constitution to get rid of nonpartisan redistricting – which requires giving voters the chance to punish politicians at the ballot box for trying such a move – they ignored the fact that many had already cast ballots before they initiated the controversial move, counting only Tuesday as the “election.”

Outgoing Attorney General Miyares issued an opinion saying that it would be illegal, but Lucas said, “Your opinions are sh–. They’re f–king s–t.”

Lucas and Scott will be two of the most important figures in Virginia because, more surprisingly than Democrats’ clean sweep of statewide races, Scott’s House of Delegates picked up 13 seats, going from a bare majority of 51 to 64, within spitting distance of a veto-proof supermajority. It was only 10 years ago that Republicans held a supermajority.

All of that means that the Democrats in today’s Virginia legislature are not like the Democrats of old. One who won a downballot race is Elizabeth Guzman, who once said parents should be criminally prosecuted for child abuse if they did not “affirm” their children as transgender. Guzman faced off against a fellow incumbent, Republican Ian Lovejoy, in his Prince William district due to redistricting. She defeated him 55%-45%.

In 2020, Guzman, a social worker, introduced a bill that redefined the term “abused or neglected child” to include one whose parent “inflicts, threatens to create or inflict, or allows to be created or inflicted upon such child a physical or mental injury on the basis of the child’s gender identity or sexual orientation.”

In 2022, she reintroduced it and clarified that “It could be a felony, it could be a misdemeanor, but we know that CPS charge could harm your employment.” At the time, the bill was dead on arrival because Republicans controlled the House.

The situation is now very different.