How would we manage without Wittman? A lot better
Bye, Felicia
Politico suggests that Wittman losing his seat might negatively impact VA-01. That’s not backed up by the facts.
His ineptitude has let other states benefit more from defense spending, EVEN THOUGH he’s Vice Chair of the House Armed Services Committee! VA’s defense economy grew just 6.5% from FY2020 to FY2023 - lagging behind the 67% national defense spending increases of 2007 to 2023. VA’s share of state GDP attributable to defense declined from 11.3% in FY2020 to 9.7% in FY2023.
Wittman has secured things like $1.6bn for VA military construction projects and Naval Weapons Station Yorktown infrastructure, but these are incremental gains, not transformative economic interventions. He’s just barely punching the clock.
What about influence? As Vice Chair of the House Armed Services Committee, he has said nothing about Hegseth’s security leaks, illegal attacks on Venezuela, the National Guard in US cities, or anything else. He silently complicit with Trump’s unauthorized, illegal, unjustified insistence on putting our people in harm’s way.
Besides, academic research on congressional seniority suggests modest benefits: one additional term of seniority yields approximately 0.27-0.83 percentage points in vote share but only about $20 per constituent in additional federal spending—statistically insignificant and economically negligible.
We can’t afford to have ineffective Wittman occupy our seat in Congress. From mid-2030s, Hampton Roads (whose economy comprises 39% defense spending) will be the center of the AUKUS submarine agreement, and could benefit from $40bn annual submarine construction spending. Do we trust Wittman to capture those opportunities? HECK NO.
Wittman hasn’t successfully advocated for VA01 jobs, companies, or the economy. He’s just kinda there. We in VA01 deserve better. And Politico should quit the pearl-clutching about Wittman’s likely ejection from our seat.