Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin of Virginia said the Republican Party has a future beyond Donald Trump if it focuses on common-sense solutions to problems that President Joe Biden and Democrats aren’t solving.
(Bloomberg) — Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin of Virginia said the Republican Party has a future beyond Donald Trump if it focuses on common-sense solutions to problems that President Joe Biden and Democrats aren’t solving.
Youngkin, the former co-CEO of Carlyle Group Inc. who was elected in 2021, was asked in an appearance at the Milken Institute Global Conference in California whether there’s a way forward for the Republican Party without the former president, the clear front-runner for the GOP nomination in 2024.
“I think there’s a future for the Republican Party for sure, and it doesn’t necessarily depend on Donald Trump,” Youngkin said.
The Virginia governor said Republicans must focus on the best policies and common-sense approaches in areas such as education and the economy because policies championed under the Biden administration haven’t worked.
“This is a moment, I believe, as Republicans where the common-sense approach to so many of these challenges resonates, and in Virginia, we’ve demonstrated that it works,” Youngkin said.
Youngkin is often mentioned as a potential Republican presidential candidate in 2024 but he said in response to a question that he’s not running this year and is focused on Virginia elections to keep Republican control of the state House and take the state Senate from Democrats.
Youngkin’s appearance comes as Virginia Democrats criticize the first term governor as excessively partisan. The governor has vetoed a record number of bills sponsored by Democrats — even those with broad bipartisanship support — during his first term as governor.
Youngkin met last week with Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen in Taipei and announced that Virginia would establish an office for economic development there. In his appearance at the Milken conference, Youngkin defended his decision in January to take Virginia out of the running for a proposed electric-vehicle battery plant by Ford Motor Co. because he believed the project’s Chinese partner made it a “Trojan horse” that would undermine policy efforts to strengthen the US auto industry.
“We’re going to need to build trusted supply chains in these most critical industries if we’re going to have an economic future that we decide upon,” he said. “But if we run towards these sectors that are currently dominated by Chinese supply chains, we’re only running into trouble.”
–With assistance from Christian Hall.
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