Oh, There's a VA Dem Who's Refusing to Concede Election Defeat

Matt Vespa | November 09, 2023 8:30 AM

Lady, it’s time to give it up. Democratic Loudoun County Commonwealth Attorney Buta Biberaj appears to have lost to Republican Bob Anderson. Biberaj has yet to concede, but Anderson’s camp says there is no pathway for Biberaj to remain in office (via Loudoun Times-Mirror):

Twenty years after he last served as commonwealth's attorney, Robert D. Anderson is on the verge of upsetting incumbent Democrat Buta Biberaj in the race for commonwealth's attorney.
With all but provisional and late-arriving mail ballots counted, Anderson led with 66,835 votes to 65,814 for Biberaj, according to unofficial results from the Virginia Department of Elections.
Despite his 1,000-vote lead, Anderson did not declare victory in the race on election night and Biberaj had not conceded at midnight.
The Virginia Public Access Project called the race for Anderson after midnight, however. On Nov. 8, the morning after Election Day, Anderson tweeted that he was confident he had won the election.
"There is no current path to victory for Buta Biberaj and we look forward to waiting for the due process to run course. I am confident the results will remain the same, and look forward to serving as your next Commonwealth's Attorney," he said.
Biberaj said on Nov. 8 that there are about 2,000 uncounted votes that should be counted by Nov. 13. She said that's when she will decide then on whether to concede or seek a recount, which requires a victory margin of 1% or less in Virginia. Anderson currently leads by about 0.8%.
"I just am not at the position where I can make a decision on a recount until I see what the data is," she said. "I have to figure out whether it's in the realm of possibility."

Biberaj is known for being a soft-on-crime prosecuting attorney with a reputation for not wanting to put people in jail, even domestic abusers. In 2022, her office was removed from a case involving a serial burglar, as the judge saw omissions in the case file in an attempt to fast-track a sweetheart plea deal.

Her refusal to concede is, according to her part, an act of rebellion. Remember, it’s only a threat to democracy when Republicans refuse to concede defeat in an election.