Profiles: Meet the candidates in Virginia's June 20 primary election

CITY POINT — At the point where the Appomattox and James rivers meet in Hopewell, former Del. Lashrecse Aird, D-Petersburg, sought to ride a rising tide of national concern over the future of abortion rights in her quest to unseat Sen. Joe Morrissey, D-Petersburg, in a new state Senate seat that could be pivotal in Virginia’s position on women’s reproductive rights.

Aird, unseated on the same night that Gov. Glenn Youngkin led a sweep of statewide offices two years ago, was flanked by a trio of abortion rights advocates who proclaimed the importance of electing her and defeating Morrissey in a Democratic primary fight in the new 13th Senate District. The contest has attracted national attention a year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

PORTSMOUTH — For what has become a trademark campaign ad, state Sen. Louise Lucas, D-Portsmouth, donned bright red boxing gloves to make her pitch for votes in the only Senate primary battle to feature two incumbents — Lucas and state Sen. Lionell Spruill Sr., D-Chesapeake.

Lucas reprised her fighting stance, sparking friendly laughter from a group of business people in her Portsmouth stronghold, to make her key argument: that, as president pro tempore of the Senate and with what she says would be a lock on the chair of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, she can deliver for Hampton Roads.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch asked all local statehouse candidates the same nine questions. Below, see the responses for Republicans Graven Craig, Del. Buddy Fowler and Philip Strother and Democrat Rachel Levy, who are running in the 59th House District that includes parts of Hanover, Louisa and Henrico counties.

Republicans will choose a nominee at a June 20 primary. 

On the issues, the three Democrats competing for the party nomination for a Richmond seat in the House of Delegates do not have many differences.

But the candidates in the 79th District — Rae Cousins, Ann-Frances Lambert and Richard Walker — have plenty of differences over money, name recognition and experience in a primary campaign in a heavily Democratic district rooted entirely in the city of Richmond.

The contest for the 57th District in Virginia’s House of Delegates, which is based in the Short Pump area of Henrico County and includes part of Goochland County, will be competitive in the fall.

But first, its two Democratic candidates — a nurse practitioner and a retired banking director-turned-political advocate — will face off for their party’s nomination in a June 20 primary.

It’s GOP territory — one of the two most Republican state Senate districts in metro Richmond. The race for the Chesterfield County-based 12th District seat is really the Republican primary, with the issue of who is more Republican than whom.

The June 20 GOP primary pits a state senator who is the only Republican who is not in the Senate GOP caucus against a former one-term senator and a candidate with a fat war chest from a failed nomination contest for Congress.

In a way, the biggest two votes in the Democratic primary for an eastern Henrico County-anchored House of Delegates district came from Charlottesville, and well before early voting opened in May.

The lobby group Clean Virginia — which says that, as a condition for getting its typically five- and six-figure campaign contributions, candidates have to foreswear getting funds from Dominion Energy — weighed in against progressive stalwart Del. Delores McQuinn, D-Henrico, who regularly votes for bills Dominion opposes.