Lance Watson, senior pastor of a large Baptist congregation in Richmond, must have spoken for hundreds of thousands of Virginians Sunday when he mentioned the prospects of Jay Jones, then the Democratic attorney general candidate, in last week’s election. 

Jones, a former Virginia delegate, faced an October surprise when violent texts he wrote in 2022 surfaced. Those texts were aimed at the then- Republican state speaker of the House of Delegates and his children. 

(Full disclosure: I’ve known Jay Jones since he was a pre-teen, because our families attend the same church in Norfolk.) 

“What’s good for the goose is good for the gander,” Watson said, two days before Jones easily defeated Jason Miyares, the Republican incumbent attorney general, in a race that had tightened because of the scandal. “Anytime I have to live with a president who has 32 felony convictions, I can forgive somebody who made a mistake on his text messages.” 

Watson, of course, was referring to President Donald Trump, who was actually convicted of 34 felony counts of falsified business records in New York last year. Trump also fomented the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol after his 2020 electoral defeat — which should have disqualified him from ever holding elective office again. 

That’s the backdrop voters in Virginia weighed when they cast ballots this year: 

Should we reject someone who fantasized violence, even though his policies might be preferable over his opponent’s? Does character matter more than the good that Jones could do in office, especially as a check on a president who scoffs at the law and whose economic policies are wreaking havoc on families? 

And if the highest office in the land is held by someone who incited a riot on Jan. 6, 2021, when several people died and others were injured, haven’t the standards for electability changed? 

Voters calculated those factors when putting Jones over the top on Nov. 4, 52.73% to 46.87%, longtime Virginia political analyst Bob Holsworth told me. 

“There was a sense among a lot of Democrats, given what Trump has done and said, that this is no big deal,” said Holsworth, a managing partner at a public policy research firm and a former dean at Virginia Commonwealth University. Jones sent the texts privately to Del. Carrie Coyner, R-Chesterfield, who lost her reelection bid last week. 

“It’s nothing like what the president does and says every day and puts into action,” Holsworth added. 

There were other factors that helped Jones and Democrats in Virginia: 

Gubernatorial winner Abigail Spanberger trounced her Republican opponent, Winsome Earle-Sears, by more than 14 points. She had long coattails for the Democratic ticket, Holsworth noted, which also saw Sen. Ghazala Hashmi, D-Richmond, win the lieutenant governor’s race. 

Abortion rights and kitchen-table economics spurred Democrats to surge to at least 64 seats in the House, up from 51 of the 100 seats right now. Turnout was up sharply in several suburban swing areas. 

Republican demonization of transgender students and athletes, especially by Earle-Sears, held little sway with voters. Good. She had no business targeting a small segment of the population for her political gain. 

Miyares didn’t always join other state attorneys general to oppose the Trump administration even when Virginians were in the crosshairs. Examples included when more than two dozen states sued over the administration’s refusal to fund food stamps during the government shutdown. The states said the impending cuts were unnecessary and illegal. 

More than 866,000 Virginians received food stamps earlier this year. Two federal judges recently ruled the administration had to keep the food program running. 

Those were some of the reasons people like Latangie Clay, 51, voted for Jones on Tuesday. 

“Sometimes people do make bad decisions,” she told me outside her polling place in Chesapeake. But Clay, who usually supports Democrats, said she researched Jones and his platform and decided he was the better choice. 

Besides, I’m sure many Virginians feel Democrats are held to higher standards of conduct while Republicans like Trump can do or say anything they want, without penalty. (See: Misogynistic Access Hollywood comments that were released before the 2016 election.) 

I’m also thinking of the calls in 2019 for then-Gov. Ralph Northam to resign for a blackface photo in his 1984 medical school yearbook. As I wrote previously: Why was resignation proportionate to his reputed offense? 

“Had Northam done nothing showing his commitment to Blacks and the disadvantaged in the years since he entered elective office?” I said. 

Holsworth told me it’s clear what’s acceptable in politics today has shifted a long way over the past few decades. He mentioned the 1985 “scandal” that harmed Republican Buster O’Brien in his longshot bid to become attorney general. 

His campaign suggested O’Brien, a quarterback, played for the Washington Redskins when, in fact, he practiced with the team for only a few weeks. Oh, the horror! 

This bit of resume boosting didn’t help O’Brien in his battle against eventual winner Mary Sue Terry, a Democrat. Nowadays, that 40-year-old episode seems … quaint. 

The bottom line is this: The age of Trump has lowered the standards for would-be officeholders. Voters will choose their interests, even when a candidate has flaws. 

And some flaws are worse than others. 

Roger Chesley 

This commentary originally appeared on VirginiaMercury.com.