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Fairfax, Virginia – He is not in the vote, but the president Donald Trump In the suburbs of Northern Virginia in Washington, DC, in Tuesday’s Congressional Special Election
The Trump administration Department of Efficiency (DOGE), crime and immigration, transgender policies, even push for the release of Justice Department’s archives of late crime archives, as voters vote in the Fairfax County Dominance.
Democratic nominee James Walkinshaw told Fox News digits that Trump pushed the sweeping and controversial agenda in the first eight months of the first eight months White House It will have a “real impact” on the special elections for the 11th Congressional District of Virginia.
Republican nominee Stewart Whitson also said Trump’s focus on the campaign because of “many of the great policies he has been advocating for.”
Trump is not in the voting, but the frontcourt and center of the 2025 election
The winner will succeed Gerry Connolly, a late-term democratic Congressman, who died in June after battling cancer.
Republicans currently control the House of Representatives 219-212, three seats vacant by Democrats and seats held by Republicans. If Walkinshaw doesn’t win Whitson’s top Whitson in nearly two decades, it will further narrow the Republican vulnerability House majority.
In an area with thousands of federal workers and contractors, many voters have been affected by the laid-offs and layoffs imposed.
Four major Republican Senate seats aim to flip in next year’s midterm elections
“Guys Northern Virginia Fairfax feels the impact of Trump’s policy. I want to say we are at the forefront of the Trump economy here. Everyone in Fairfax knows someone, maybe someone on their street, maybe the parents of the kid’s football team, who are out of work due to Doge or Trump policies. ”
Walkinshaw, a member of the Fairfax County Oversight Board, previously served as Connolly’s Chief of Staff, argued: “If Trump’s policies continue, tariffs, the so-called big and beautiful Bill, it will be a situation across the country. So, I think we think tomorrow’s voters will make statements about this information.”
The campaign signs of Republican Stewart Whitson and Democrat James Walkinshaw were seen in Fairfax County, Virginia on September 8, 2025, in the eve of the special elections in Virginia’s 11th Congressional District. (Paul Steinhauser-Fox News)
Whitson, a veteran and former FBI agent who runs federal affairs for a conservative think tank, told Fox News Digital, “People who are unemployed or worried about unemployed in our area don’t need empathy. They need solutions.”
Walkinshaw, he said, is “claiming that he will fight President Trump and fight the administration. My move to voters in our region is: Is this to help? Will it help improve the situation? The answer is no.”
“We need someone to represent the people we can work with, whether Republican or Democrats,” Whitson stressed.
He pointed to unemployed federal workers and contractors, saying: “I wanted to find a way to get them back in. I also wanted to find other economic opportunities for them.”
While Trump is not very popular in the region – the president won only 31% of the vote in the White House reelection last year – Whitson said Trump’s policy “centered on … common sense.”
President Donald Trump met at the White House Oval Office in Washington, D.C. on Thursday, August 14, 2025, without votes in the special congressional elections in Virginia on Tuesday, but his agenda dominated the campaign. (Will Oliver/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
He believes that the Democrats said: “People in our area realize that the radical left has just moved away from common sense … radical policies they are pushing for our children, which is a fear of our children, which is a crime policy that makes us safer. These issues are important to our voters.”
Whitson pointed to the ongoing battle that allows trans children to use public school bathrooms at some Fairfax County schools, which are centered on Walkinshaw.
“My opponents think it’s a civil right for men who are identified as girls or women to enter our girls locker room and watch them change. I think it’s all backwards,” Whitson accused. “I think it’s a civil right for girls and women to see a female sign in the bathroom, and they know they can get in there and stay safe. Back to common sense. I’m a father with five kids. Three of them are daughters.”
Walkinshaw charged that Whitson has “been really obsessed with how maybe 1% of the kids in our schools use the bathrooms, and what I’m focused on is how 100% of our kids can succeed in the classrooms. So the threats to pull federal foundation, the dismantling of the Department of Education, threatens the performance of our kids in the classrooms, and that’s what I’m focused on.”
Whitson has also been trying to connect Walkinshaw to socialist candidate Zohran Mamdani, who won the political world in New York City in June after winning the Democratic mayor nomination.
Whitson listed Walkinshaw’s record and his advice, “This is a history with many of the exact same policy history that supports Mamdani’s support. So I’m going to let voters compare….”
When asked about the comparison, Walkinshaw said during four months of the campaign this summer: “No voter asked me about the New York mayoral election. I don’t care what will happen to the New York mayoral election. I care what will happen to people in District 11.”
Republican congressional candidate Stewart Whitson linked his opponent to Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani in Tuesday’s special election (pictured). (Lev Radin/Pacific Press/Lightrocket via Getty Images)
But Walkinshaw said what he heard on the campaign was that both Democrats and Republicans pushed the Justice Department to release files related to a federal investigation into Epstein, who died in jail while awaiting federal charges related to sex trafficking.
“One of these things I heard from Democrats, independents and many Republicans and conservatives who believe that Donald Trump covered up the cover of these archives during the Biden administration. They covered him up his words and now they want to know if he is lying.
If he wins Tuesday’s election, Walkinshaw said he will immediately sign a release petition for Rep. Ro Khanna, Democrat of California, and Rep. Thomas Massie, Republican of Kentucky. The petition currently has only a few votes that are not favorable to pass, calling on the House of Representatives to vote and urge the Justice Department to release the document.
“I will definitely sign it,” he said. “I think the American people should know. I want to know what the Trump administration is covering up (if any). Now, the discharge petition is the tool to do that.”
Whitson argued, “My opponent was really late to the game,” and “I called for full disclosure of all records in Epstein’s archives a few months ago.”
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Whitson points to his years as a federal law enforcement officer in declassifying documents and accused Walkinshaw of using the problem as a political weapon.
“How long has the case happened, and now he finally wants to know the records. What does that mean? It means he doesn’t care about these victims at all. He is using the pain and suffering they have suffered to try to get political benefits.”
Fox News’s Kiera McDonald contributed to the report.
