Why did Virginia swing Republican in 2004?

[MT Treasurer]

I know it only swung 0.16% to the right from 2000, but it is still a bit surprising to me with hindsight, especially considering what happened in the state after 2006.

[Redban]

Democrats didn't contest the state, as they --- blinded by the streak dating back to 1964 --- failed to realize that the state was purple. Karl Rove has gone on record saying that they got lucky in 2004 when Kerry decided not to go for Virginia (no visits to the state, no ads ... nothing).

The failure to challenge Virginia was probably one of the biggest mistakes in the Kerry campaign.

[TDAS04]

Democrats didn't contest the state, as they --- blinded by the streak dating back to 1964 --- failed to realize that the state was purple. Karl Rove has gone on record saying that they got lucky in 2004 when Kerry decided not to go for Virginia (no visits to the state, no ads ... nothing).

The failure to challenge Virginia was probably one of the biggest mistakes in the Kerry campaign.

This.  Also, Southwest Virginia.

[Frozen Sky Ever Why]

Suburbs liked Bush's tough guy image on terrorism.

[Kaine for Senate '18]

Democrats didn't contest the state, as they --- blinded by the streak dating back to 1964 --- failed to realize that the state was purple. Karl Rove has gone on record saying that they got lucky in 2004 when Kerry decided not to go for Virginia (no visits to the state, no ads ... nothing).

The failure to challenge Virginia was probably one of the biggest mistakes in the Kerry campaign.

This.  Also, Southwest Virginia.

[Obama-Biden Democrat]

I know it only swung 0.16% to the right from 2000, but it is still a bit surprising to me with hindsight, especially considering what happened in the state after 2006.

Because Al Gore won the popular vote by .5 %, and Kerry lost by 2.5 %. The nation as a whole swung by 3 points, while Virginia only swung by .14, signalling a very strong Democratic trend.

[Del Tachi]

College educated White people in the NOVA suburbs were still an overwhelmingly Republican-voting constituency.

[LLR]

This is even more shocking now IMO.

Not really, the Democratic VP was from here and it didn't swing that much

[pikachu]

A lot of the explanations here don't make sense - while NoVa did vote Bush in 2004, all of the main NoVa counties swung towards Kerry, and Kerry was the first Democrat to win Fairfax since 1964. Bush's swing looks like it primarily came from the southwest and the Hampton Roads area.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Wow McCain got more votes than W Bush in VA