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by Brandon Jarvis

With the first gubernatorial debate happening Thursday night, Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe is releasing a new attack ad Wednesday against his Republican opponent, Glenn Youngkin. 

The TV ad takes aim at Wall Street business dealings from The Carlyle Group while Youngkin was employed with the global investment firm. 

“Glenn Youngkin likes to talk about his time on Wall Street. But the truth is it was only great for Glenn Youngkin,” the narrator of the ad says. Businesses went bankrupt, thousands laid off, even neglecting seniors in nursing homes, hurting kids, and bilking taxpayers.  But Glenn Youngkin, he walked away with over $500 million dollars. We can’t trust him to lead Virginia.” 

The Youngkin campaign pointed out Wednesday that McAuliffe has invested in Carlyle.

“Terry McAuliffe is a dishonest, stale politician who talks out of both sides of his mouth,” said Macaulay Porter, a spokesperson for Youngkin. “McAuliffe’s bogus attacks ring hollow because he is still an investor in The Carlyle Group and has invested millions of dollars in private equity companies. All McAuliffe can do is talk because he had a chance to do these things as governor, and he failed. As a young man, Glenn joined The Carlyle Group when it was a small company and over the next 25 years worked his way up to the top of the company, helping to grow it into a hugely successful enterprise that turned good businesses into great businesses, created tens of thousands of jobs, and funded the retirement pensions of police officers, firefighters, and teachers. Under Youngkin’s leadership, Carlyle employed nearly 2,000 people and managed assets totaling nearly four times the size of Virginia’s yearly budget. After he left Carlyle to serve Virginians, Youngkin cofounded the Virginia Ready Initiative, a nonprofit, public-private partnership dedicated to helping Virginians who are out of work get the training they need to secure in-demand jobs.”

McAuliffe is slightly leading Youngkin in recent polling for the Nov. 2 election. The two candidates will meet for their first in-person debate Thursday night at 7 p.m. The debate will be broadcast on CBS 6 in Richmond, News 3 in Hampton Roads, WZBJ24 in Roanoke, WJLA in Northern Virginia, and streamed online at WTVR.

Early voting begins on Sept. 17.


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By vascope