‘They want us to get distracted by the text message here,’ Don Scott says
Virginia house speaker Don Scott (D.) told voters they “can’t get distracted” by text messages attorney general candidate Jay Jones (D.) sent fantasizing about shooting a top state Republican.
“We have to be mature in our thinking and how we vote,” Scott said Sunday while speaking to Mount Calvary Baptist Church’s congregation in Hopewell, Va. “We can’t get distracted, because they want us to get distracted by the text message here or something else—stay focused.”
Jones, angry about Republicans eulogizing a late state senator, said in a series of text messages to house delegate Carrie Coyner (R.) in 2022 that then-Virginia house speaker Todd Gilbert (R.) deserved “two bullets to the head.” He also wished death on Gilbert’s children and said the GOP leader was “breeding little fascists,” according to National Review.
Scott’s comments to a targeted audience strikes a major tone shift from the statement he released when Jones’s texts first surfaced.
“What Jay said was harmful, reckless, and wrong,” Scott said just days before his speech from the pulpit. “I believe he needs to apologize now. He must take accountability for his words, and then reflect and pray.”
Jones initially refused to apologize and accused his challenger, incumbent Jason Miyares (R.), of leaking the texts as part of a smear campaign, though he ultimately said he was “embarrassed, ashamed, and sorry.”
Other Virginia Democrats have also shrugged off Jones’s comments. Although state senate president pro tempore Louise Lucas (D.) and senate majority chair Mamie Locke (D.) said they were “deeply disturbed” by the texts, they still urged Virginians to vote for him.
“[W]e will not allow this moment to … distract from the urgent fight we are all in for Virginia’s future,” they said in a joint statement Friday. “The choice before us is far bigger than this mistake.”
On Saturday, Virginia Beach Democrats called on “all Virginians to line up behind Jay Jones,” calling him “a leader who learns, grows, and stands for everyday people.”
Not everyone on the left is standing up for Jones. MSNBC host Joe Scarborough said Jones should drop out of the election.
“He should probably be forced to withdraw from the race, and ‘probably’ is doing a lot there,” Scarborough said.
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