Highlights this Week:

1. Northam calls Special Session for August 2 – federal funding and judicial vacancies on the agenda

2. VA budget surplus could now be closer to $2 billion

COVID-19

KEY MEASURES: Virginia Department of Health

Dashboard updated 6/25/2021. Case counts reflect what has been reported to VDH by healthcare providers and laboratories.

Visit the VDH Dashboard

70% of VA adults vaccinated, gaps remain

“While lauding the strides the state has taken to beat the Fourth of July deadline, Gov. Ralph Northam on Monday acknowledged the variant’s threat to progress…”

Coverage from The Roanoke Times

Localities awaiting guidance on VA mask law

“Under the law, no one older than 16 is allowed to wear a mask with intentions to conceal their identity in a public place or on private property. Violating the law can result in a class 6 felony..“

Full story in the Daily News-Record

Virginia Department of Health

Coronavirus in Virginia: State Hub

Centers for Disease Control

Virginia Politics

Government & Policy

What Virginia’s marijuana legalization bill actually says

The legislation that will make possession and cultivation of marijuana legal on July 1 is almost 300 pages. But in reality, only a few sections are actually going into effect.

That’s because lawmakers included hundreds of pages of rules and regulations they’d like to enact, but couldn’t yet agree on. So, at the end of the session, they slapped what they call a “re-enactment clause” on it. Basically, it’s a road map for what the General Assembly might do next year.

Reporting from Virginia Mercury »

Statewide Races

McAuliffe commits to five debates in Virginia governor’s race, Youngkin to one

RICHMOND — Republican gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin has so far agreed to just one debate with his Democratic opponent, former governor Terry McAuliffe — not the five McAuliffe wants as he seeks a comeback to the Virginia governor’s mansion.

Youngkin, a political newcomer and former Carlyle Group executive, says he will debate McAuliffe at the Appalachian School of Law, in the state’s bright-red southwestern corner — honoring a promise he made in March, before winning his party’s gubernatorial nomination. That debate is expected to take place in August or September.

Youngkin said he’s willing to participate in two additional debates if his campaign can come to an agreement with McAuliffe’s on certain details, including the dates, locations, broadcasters and moderators.

View coverage from the Washington Post »

General Assembly

Petition to recall state Sen. Louise Lucas over Portsmouth’s Confederate monument protest gets more than 4,600 signatures

CHESAPEAKE — Over 4,600 registered voters in Virginia’s 18th Senate District signed a petition to recall state Sen. Louise Lucas, accusing her of misusing her role as an elected official during a protest last summer in Portsmouth.

The petition, filed Tuesday afternoon in Chesapeake Circuit Court, claims Lucas “escalate(d) the aggression of the protesters” that day when she asked Portsmouth police to refrain from arresting demonstrators and told the crowd no one would be arrested. The document alleges Lucas prevented officers from performing their “sworn duty to the community to preserve property and life.”

View coverage from The Virginia-Pilot »

Elections 2021

Republicans roll out target list in bid to take back Virginia state House

Republicans are launching their opening attack on Democrats in Virginia as the GOP looks to flip the state House of Delegates.

The Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC), the body in charge of working to elect Republicans to state legislative seats, unveiled Tuesday an initial list of 13 Democratic incumbents in the chamber who the committee plans to focus on going into this November’s elections in Virginia.

The RSLC is also launching a six-figure ad campaign in key districts looking to tie the lawmakers to Democrats in Washington and to policies that are known to rile up the GOP base.

Federal

Sen. Mark Warner looks to the late Sen. John Warner as inspiration for bipartisan infrastructure deal

U.S. Sen. Mark Warner had just met with President Joe Biden and nine other senators to seal a bipartisan deal with $579 billion in new spending on public infrastructure — highways and bridges, rail and public transit, broadband telecommunications, the electric power grid and electric vehicle charging stations, and protection for flood-prone coastal communities.

Outside the White House on Thursday, Warner took a moment to praise the late Sen. John Warner, a Virginia Republican whom he had eulogized at the Washington Cathedral the day before, as an example of bipartisanship leadership for Congress to get important things done for the country.

“My hope is when this framework [for an infrastructure bill] becomes law, that we do it in the spirit of John Warner, and I would hope to convince my colleagues that we should name this legislation after him,” he said, flanked by Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., among the 10 senators who had met with Biden to reach the agreement.

Full story from the RT-D »

Business, Economy, & Labor News

Without broadband expansion, Virginia farmers will fall behind, U.S. Sec. Agriculture says

RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC)- Expanding broadband to the 35 percent of rural Americans who still don’t have access to high speed internet is critical to keep the country’s agriculture industry competitive and to protect the environment. Full story »

Va. new jobless claims dropped below 7,000 last week

Virginia Business »

Report: Minority-owned businesses in Northern Virginia face more post-COVID struggles

Inside NoVA »

Gov. Northman announces $11.1 Million in GO Virginia Grants

NBC 12 »

2021 Virginia General Election

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RECAP: Virginia This Week (June 25, 2021)