1/2: Some thoughts on VA01 from someone who’s been around the region and has been represented by @ReElectWittman for most of my life. In 2006, I was starting high school and just began to get active in politics after meeting @GeorgeAllenVA at Discovery Days in Stafford. Less than a year later, my congresswoman, Jo Ann Davis, died in office after a battle with breast cancer. Roughly a dozen GOP candidates emerged, with several even stopping by my high school looking for campaign vols. Going into the convention, the names to watch were Jo Ann’s widower Chuck, a firefighter, Loudoun Del. @SenRichardBlack, @jatticusbowden, Williamsburg businessman Paul Jost (now a Libertarian activist/donor in FL), Wittman who was a freshman Delegate, was a dark horse. Jost entered the convention as the frontrunner and led through five completed ballots. As the sixth round unfolded, Davis and others rallied behind Wittman, Jost conceded, and Rob walked out with the nomination. From 2006 to 2011, I saw Wittman at large events, small events, cookouts, community gatherings, random local functions nobody outside VA01 would ever know happened. Wittman was always there. He remembers people’s names, faces, where you’re from, what you talked about the last time he saw you. I’ve watched him do that through multiple versions of VA01, from when the district included Williamsburg and stretched into Prince William County to how it exists today. He’s also always been unusually accessible. Personal texts, personal emails, not just official or campaign accounts, but the kind of contact information you normally associate with someone you actually know. I could text Rob this morning and there’s a pretty good chance I’d hear back before lunch. That has always stuck with me. A sitting member of Congress with the business of the world in front of him, and some constituent back home sends him a text and actually gets a timely answer. Do that for almost 20 years and it adds up. Thousands of handshakes, conversations, returned emails, texts and remembered names. That’s what I mean when I talk about Wittman’s political farm system. I think that matters because Wittman’s electoral durability is real. He has continued to perform strongly even as VA01 has become more competitive. That doesn’t prove every handshake becomes a vote, but I don’t think his personal relationships can simply be dismissed as the ordinary advantage that comes with incumbency. At the same time, there is real anger out there, including some directed at Wittman. The lack of traditional in person Town Halls is part of it. Those kinds of events were once a staple of politics around here. @EricCantor did them. @DaveBratVA7th did them. @SpanbergerForVA did them. Sometimes the exchange between Representative and constituent became uncomfortable enough to make the local news, but that give and take was part of the relationship between voters and the person they sent to Washington. Wittman currently promotes telephone town halls through his congressional office, but that isn’t the same experience as putting a member of Congress in a room with constituents.