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Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin Donates First Quarter Salary To Good News Prison Ministry
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin answers questions from members of the media after touring an H Mart supermarket while meeting with Asian community leaders on April 06, 2023, in Fairfax, Virginia. Youngkin spent the morning visiting with constituents across Northern Virginia. | Win McNamee/Getty ImagesA prison ministry that was the recipient of Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin's first-quarter salary praised his action, saying it will help "bring the Gospel to inmates in over 350 jails and prisons worldwide.”
While touring Prince William County's Adult Detention Center on March 31, Youngkin announced his decision to donate his first quarter salary to Good News Jail & Prison Ministry, which his office identified as “an organization dedicated to supplying faith-based resources for jails and prisons in the Commonwealth of Virginia and worldwide.”
Youngkin presented the ministry, based in Henrico, Virginia, with a check for $43,750.
The governor of Virginia receives an annual salary of $175,000, according to the Council of State Governments. “I pledged to serve without accepting a salary to support Virginians in every way I can,” Youngkin said in a statement.
“The Good News Jail & Prison Ministry exemplifies the heart and Spirit of Virginia by providing hope, resources, and transformational opportunities for Virginians,” he added. “This administration continues to respect the law and those inside the criminal justice system with increased access to mental health services, best practices for trade skill acquisition and by maintaining excellence in the restoration of rights process, among other priorities.”
Virginia First Lady Suzanne Youngkin praised “the life-changing mission” of Good News Jail and Prison Ministry, adding: “We firmly believe that every Virginian deserves an opportunity to flourish and we are grateful for this opportunity to support great and Godly works.”
Good News Jail & Prison Ministry reacted to finding out that Youngkin planned to donate his first-quarter salary to their organization in a Facebook post shared last week. The organization declared, “Thank you, Governor Glenn Youngkin and Suzanne, for your gift to bring the Gospel to inmates in over 350 jails and prisons worldwide.”
The ministry said Youngkin’s donation comes ahead of Second Chance Day, which seeks to raise $150,000 to support chaplains who seek to “share the Gospel with thousands of inmates a year” and thereby give them “a second chance at a new beginning in Christ.” As documented on its website, the organization places “Christian chaplains in jails and prisons to minister to the spiritual needs of inmates and staff.”
Good News’ efforts to meet the spiritual needs of the imprisoned include the Life Learning Program, a “biblically centered program designed to teach inmates how their world and personal view relates to every area of life,” including “acceptance as a person, getting along with those around us” as well as the importance of forgiveness, “how to handle ‘going to prison,’ how to handle ‘getting out’” in addition to “responsibility and accountability to family, job and authority.”
Good News President Jon Evans described the Life Learning Program as “a structured approach to teaching inmates the truth of God’s Word.”
He added, “As they grasp what God has done for them in Christ, a flame of hope for their future is ignited, and many begin to believe for the first time that their lives matter.”
Good News has also developed a “Bible Correspondence Course,” which “consists of over 400 individual Bible studies” that require “the inmate to study the selected book of The Bible verse by verse.” Each study “begins with the Gospel of John and then moves through other books of the Bible and two general discipleship overview courses.”
“After the inmate completes each lesson a volunteer grader provides feedback to encourage the inmate in their progress. When an inmate completes all the courses offered they are awarded a Study Bible and other resources for their further spiritual growth.”
Serving 300,000 inmates across 22 states and 25 countries, Good News also acts as “the ‘humanitarian’ providers” for the imprisoned in some cases. It notes that “in many foreign prison systems, inmates are not fed, clothed or provided medical care by the government,” putting “family or others on the outside” on the hook for the necessary supplies.
Since taking office in January 2022, Youngkin has donated his quarterly gubernatorial salary to multiple organizations, including the Virginia Law Enforcement Assistance Program, which ministers to law enforcement officials who have experienced “traumatic clinical incidents,” the Virginia Veterans Services Program, G³ Community Services, which provides student mentorship to those interest in pursuing careers in science, technology, engineering, the arts and mathematics as well as Pathways, which provides assistance to low-income families.
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.Foley@christianpost.Com
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Youngkin Gives 2024 Presidential Run The Cold Shoulder
Virginia’s governor is putting the presidential hoopla on ice.
Gov. Glenn Youngkin, the Republican whose surprising election in a blue-trending state set off instant talk of a presidential run, has tapped the brakes on 2024, telling advisers and donors that his sole focus is on Virginia’s legislative elections in the fall.
Mr. Youngkin hopes to flip the state legislature to a Republican majority. That could earn him a closer look from rank-and-file Republicans across the country, who so far have been indifferent to the presidential chatter surrounding him in the news media, and among heavyweight donors he would need to keep pace alongside more prominent candidates. He has yet to crack 1 percent in polls about the potential Republican field.
Backing away for now is also a bow to political reality. Mr. Youngkin has a shortage of clean conservative victories in the divided Virginia legislature, compared with, say, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, who stole much of Mr. Youngkin’s thunder on “parents’ rights” issues in education.
An effort by Mr. Youngkin last year to raise his profile by campaigning for Republicans around the country fizzled when most proved too extreme for voters and lost their races.
Tellingly, Mr. Youngkin’s two top political advisers, who guided his gubernatorial victory and were mapping out a 2024 strategy, both took jobs this month with a super PAC that supports the presidential candidacy of Mr. DeSantis.
Asked about his presidential decision timeline this week, Mr. Youngkin said, “Listen, I didn’t write a book, and I’m not in Iowa or New Hampshire or South Carolina.” Instead, he said, he is putting his full focus on November’s statewide Virginia election, when all 140 seats in both chambers of the General Assembly are on the ballot. A decision to enter the 2024 campaign in November would be historically late, well past the first Republican debate in August.
“I am wholly focused on the Commonwealth of Virginia, and I’m looking forward to these elections,’’ Mr. Youngkin said during an appearance to promote Virginia’s agricultural exports. Standing outdoors at a terminal for barges near Richmond — dressed in a blue suit and tie rather than the red fleece vest he wore while seeking office, a symbol of his suburban dad-ness — the governor, 56, said that gaining majorities in the legislature “is what this year is all about.”
Card 1 of 8The race begins. Four years after a historically large number of candidates ran for president, the field for the 2024 campaign is starting out small and is likely to be headlined by the same two men who ran last time: President Biden and Donald Trump. Here’s who has entered the race so far, and who else might run:
Donald Trump. The former president is running to retake the office he lost in 2020. Though somewhat diminished in influence within the Republican Party — and facing several legal investigations — he retains a large and committed base of supporters, and he could be aided in the primary by multiple challengers splitting a limited anti-Trump vote.
Asa Hutchinson. The former governor of Arkansas is one of a relatively small number of Republicans who have been openly critical of Trump. Hutchinson has denounced the former president’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election and said Trump should drop out of the presidential race.
Marianne Williamson. The self-help author and former spiritual adviser to Oprah Winfrey is running for a second time. In her 2020 campaign, the Democrat called for a federal Department of Peace, supported reparations for slavery and called Trumpism a symptom of an illness in the American psyche that could not be cured with political policies.
His political fund-raising committees announced last week that they had collected $2.75 million in the first three months of the year, surpassing the best quarterly results of any prior Virginia governor and providing a war chest that could help Republicans in local races.
“There is no amount of money that is going to overcome the regressive policies that Glenn Younkin and the MAGA Republicans have been trying to impose on Virginia,” said Susan Swecker, the chairwoman of the Democratic Party of Virginia.
She predicted that suburban voters who favored Mr. Youngkin in 2021 would broadly reject Republicans, after the Supreme Court ended the national right to abortion last year and as conservatives press for national restrictions, most recently through a federal judge in Texas who revoked the 23-year-old approval of a common abortion pill.
“We’re going to remind voters of this every single day: Don’t treat women like second-class citizens,” Ms. Swecker said.
Republicans are counting on Mr. Younkgin’s strong job approval rating, 57 percent in a poll last month from Roanoke College, and his fund-raising prowess as a wealthy former financial executive who can connect with the G.O.P. Donor class well beyond his state.
Francis Rooney, a former Republican congressman from Florida whose family owns construction, real estate and insurance businesses, donated $100,000 to Mr. Youngkin in November.
“We need to be doing things as Republicans to get back to a broader majority,’’ said Mr. Rooney, praising the governor’s appeal to independents and some Democratic voters. But when asked what Mr. Youngkin had told donors about his presidential ambitions, he said, “I don’t think anybody knows other than him.”
Recently, Mr. Youngkin’s top political strategist, Jeff Roe, who continued to advise him after guiding the 2021 race, signed on as a consultant to a super PAC preparing the ground for a DeSantis presidential run.
Another top Youngkin strategist, Kristin Davison, joined the same DeSantis group, Never Back Down. (Mr. Roe and Ms. Davison also continue to consult for Mr. Youngkin.)
The day after Mr. Roe’s new job was reported, Mr. Youngkin named a new adviser to run his political action committee, Spirit of Virginia. That strategist, Dave Rexrode, has a long history in local Virginia elections.
“If you look at where House and Senate districts are in play, the governor has a high job approval in all these districts,” Mr. Rexrode said. “They like what he’s doing in Richmond, and they want to send allies to work with the governor.”
Virginia’s legislative races will be contested based on new maps that were drawn without regard for incumbents, deeply scrambled familiar political geographies and led to a wave of retirements. Both parties consider the House of Delegates, where Republicans hold a slight majority, and the State Senate, which Democrats narrowly control, to be in play.
In his first year in office with the divided legislature, Mr. Youngkin won $4 billion in tax cuts while giving teachers a 10 percent raise in a budget deal with Democrats. He also signed a bill giving parents a veto over schoolbooks with “sexually explicit content,” a measure rooted in one mother’s objection to Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” in the curriculum.
This year, Democrats stopped Mr. Youngkin’s proposed 15-week abortion ban. But on his own, he has rolled back the policies of earlier governors of both parties that automatically restored voting rights to people leaving prison. He has used executive orders to try to rescind environmental mandates from previous administrations, including on power-plant emissions and gas-powered vehicles.
On Monday, Mr. Youngkin was asked about the ruling by the Texas judge last week invalidating the Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the abortion pill mifepristone. If upheld, it would reduce access to abortions for Virginia women, even though abortion is legal in the state.
Mr. Youngkin said he didn’t “have much of an opinion” on the case, which is making its way through appeals courts. “And we’ll just have to wait to see how that gets finalized,” he said.
If Mr. Youngkin does wait until after November’s elections to enter the presidential primary, he not only will miss the first Republican debate in August, but he will also start considerably behind his potential rivals in fund-raising and voter attention. He would be bucking recent history, when very few presidential hopefuls waited past summer and none went on to win their party nomination.
But the 2024 cycle could be different, with former President Donald J. Trump directing fire and fury at early challengers who pick up steam, notably Mr. DeSantis, who has fallen back in polls.
Larry J. Sabato, director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, said missing the first debate could be a blessing. “The people who are in it are going to get banged up” by Mr. Trump, he said.
If Virginia Republicans win control of both chambers of the legislature, Mr. Youngkin would emerge as “the fresh face, the new conqueror” of a state that, through 2020, was under full Democratic control, Mr. Sabato said.
Given the electoral losses Republicans have repeatedly suffered in the Trump era, Mr. Youngkin “can step in and promise to put the party together,” he added. At least, he said, “that’s their theory.”
Virginia's Rising Star GOP Governor Glenn Youngkin PAUSES Plans To Enter 2024 White House Race As Trump's Poll Numbers Soar And DeSantis Tours US
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin has reportedly shelved plans to run for president in 2024.
The GOP lawman is seen as a rising star in the Republican party following his surprising gubernatorial win in the formerly blue state in 2021.
Amid Donald Trump's surge in the polls following his bombshell indictment in New York, and an expected 2024 announcement from Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Youngkin has decided against throwing his hat in the ring.
According to The New York Times, the 56-year-old has told advisors and fundraisers that he is tapping the breaks on a run for the White House, and is instead focusing on flipping Virginia's legislature red in the upcoming state elections in the fall.
Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin has reportedly shelved plans to run for president in 2024
Youngkin's expected decision to halt his presidential plans comes after another potential candidate, Donald Trump's former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, also announced he would not enter the race.
Youngkin stormed to a surprise victory over Terry McAuliffe two years ago off the back of a fierce campaign focusing on many of the 'culture war' issues that are expected to dominate the impending presidential race.
But his championing of parents' rights and education have since been co-opted by DeSantis, who boasts a more impressive legislative record in Florida than Youngkin has in Virginia.
And in a heated race where DeSantis is anticipated to take center stage in a political slugfest with Donald Trump, it appears that several would-be candidates have decided to forgo their own runs.
Announcing his decision not to run, former Trump cabinet member-turned critic Pompeo admitted to Fox News: 'This isn't our moment'.
According to the Times, two of Youngkin's top advisors, who orchestrated his shock victory in 2021 and were set to guide his 2024 presidential run, recently jumped ship and joined a super PAC supporting DeSantis' unannounced candidacy.
Donald Trump has enjoyed a huge polls bump in the wake of his indictment over hush money charges, and subsequent arraignment
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, pictured at an April 14, 2022, rally, is widely expected to announce his own 2024 presidential run
Former President Donald Trump has seen a surge in the polls following his bombshell indictment in New York
When asked about whether he was mulling his own run for the White House in the coming months, Youngkin said this week: 'Listen, I didn't write a book, and I'm not in Iowa or New Hampshire or South Carolina.'
His remarks were seemingly pointing to DeSantis' recent book tour, seen by many as a soft-launch of his presidential campaign, providing an opportunity to visit early voting states before an official announcement.
Instead of laying the groundwork for a 2024 campaign, Youngkin said he is focusing upon November's elections in Virginia, where all 140 seats in the legislature are up for grabs.
He added that taking control of Virginia's state congress 'is what this year is all about'.
Fully controlling the legislature, which is currently under Democrat control in the Senate while the Republicans have a small four seat majority in the House, would provide Youngkin more opportunity to push through conservative policies and build a national profile as DeSantis has done in Florida.
However, he has previously signaled his intention to capitalize on issues underpinning DeSantis' potential campaign, including signing a bill giving parents a veto over any books being included in school classrooms.
Youngkin, pictured April 6, 2023, has said he is fully focused on Virginia's upcoming legislative elections instead of a presidential run
President Joe Biden, who has not yet announced a re-election campaign, has repeatedly insisted it is his intention to run again in 2024
Youngkin's apparent decision to halt his presidential aspirations comes as the 2024 Republican nomination race is seemingly set to revolve around a Trump and DeSantis matchup.
Following Donald Trump's recent indictment on charges related to a hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in 2016, he has seen a tangible surge in support for his comeback White House bid.
According to Politico, Trump's campaign and fundraising committees have raked in over $15 million in the wake of the indictment.
And in a shocking new poll from Victory Insights, his post-arrest bounce has seen him take a considerable lead in early election polls. In Florida, DeSantis' home state, Trump won support from 46.6 percent of likely voters, compared to just 31.8 percent from his likely 2024 rival.
In another Victory Insight poll from November, when Trump announced his comeback campaign, DeSantis was beating the former president by 10.9 percent.
The potential for a two-horse race in the nomination battle has not South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, however, who announced Wednesday that he is launching a presidential exploratory committee - the first step in committing to a run for the White House.
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