Last Night’s Virginia Election Normalized Political Violence in America (Opinion)

Last night, 1,752,450 Virginia voters indicated their support of a politician who has wished death upon a political opponent and that opponent’s family. This is, sadly, the culmination of years of applauding and even glorifying political violence.

For those not familiar, In October 2025, three-year-old private texts leaked in which Jay Jones, Democrat candidate for Attorney General in Virginia, fantasized about putting “two bullets to the head” of Republican House Speaker Todd Gilbert and watching Gilbert’s children die.

“Three people, two bullets. Gilbert, Hitler, and Pol Pot… Gilbert gets two bullets to the head.”
“Spoiler: put Gilbert in the crew with the two worst people you know and he receives both bullets every time.”
“Only when people feel pain personally do they move on policy… I hope Jennifer Gilbert holds her dying children in her arms one day.”

Jay Jones (2022)

And unfortunately, when it comes to glorifying political violence, Jones is looking more like the norm than an outlier within the past several years.

Here’s a recent timeline:

• July 2024: Trump grazed in Butler.
• Sept 2024: Trump golf-course SKS incident.
• April 2025: Shapiro mansion firebombed.
• June 14, 2025: Former MN House Speaker Hortman and husband assassinated, MN State Senator Hoffman and family attempted assassination
• Sept 10, 2025: Charlie Kirk murdered on stage.
• Nov 4, 2025: Virginia says “hold my beer.” and elects Jay Jones.

Now, Jones may have apologized, but he still said those things, and the fact that the next top prosecutor for the state of Virginia would ever say those things seriously throws into question his ability to reasonably exercise his duties impartially. But even more disturbing is that for each of these events, large numbers of people on the opposite side of the political spectrum celebrated. Not only did they celebrate, they wanted more. They cried out in some instances that “somebody needs to finish the job” or other such hateful rhetoric. We have replaced sane discussion with not only hateful rhetoric, but bloodthirst, on both sides of the aisle.

And I wish I could say we haven’t seen this locally. But we have.

• Late 2020: Jacqueline Fischer posts on social media hoping that Donald Trump dies from COVID
• October 2023: Assassination of Washington County Judge Wilkinson
• June 2025: Physical incident between protesters and counter-protester at a Hagerstown “No Kings” rally
• October 2025: Physical incident between protesters and counter-protester at a Hagerstown “No Kings” rally involving a Maryland Delegate Candidate allegedly punching the counter-protester from behind into the street

In addition to the above incidents, I’ve seen people on social media with hateful rhetoric that the counter-protester “deserved it”, as well as even people saying that they wish Maryland Governor Wes Moore would die. So much hate in people’s hearts, it’s sad and terrifying.

I want to be clear here. At no point should it ever be acceptable to resort to violence due to the words of another person. And I fully blame the “speech is violence” and “words are violence” advocates. And hand-in-hand with these phrases are phrases such as “punch Nazis“, and “free speech or die“. With rhetoric like this, combined with a decade of comparing Donald Trump to Hitler, is it any wonder why there have been multiple assassination attempts against him?

In April 2025, Cody Balmer scaled the fence of Pennsylvania’s governor mansion at 2 a.m., beer-bottle Molotovs in hand. In the 911 call he placed afterward, he ranted that Josh Shapiro was “a monster” who “wants to do to the Palestinian people” what Balmer feared. Shapiro’s public sin: vocal support for Israel and a two-state solution. Balmer didn’t bomb a policy paper—he bombed a Passover seder. Yet the warrant affidavits show he saw Shapiro’s speeches as genocidal acts, so arson became “resistance.” Twenty-five guests and three kids asleep upstairs? Acceptable collateral in the new math where a press conference equals a war crime.

When Tyler James Robinson allegedly sniper-shot Charlie Kirk on a Utah stage in September 2025, prosecutors released the killer’s own words: “I had enough of his hatred… some hate can’t be negotiated out.” Kirk’s crime? Debating college kids about pronouns and borders. To Robinson, those sentences were bullets; his bullet was therefore self-defense. The same week, left-wing corners of social media lit up with “words are violence” memes—now retrofitted to explain why Kirk had it coming.

After Kirk, the ADL got death threats for calling TPUSA “extremist.” After Shapiro, Gaza encampments on campuses started chanting “words are violence, fire is speech.” Each side now carries the same permission slip: if my enemy’s microphone is a gun, my gun is just punctuation.

With a year until the next gubernatorial election, I’m very nervous what the future holds, and truly fear it may become even more violent. I pray for peace.

Opinion article by Ken Buckler. All opinions are his own, and do not reflect those of our clients or sponsors.

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