Youngkin’s political adviser under fire as extortion allegations rock Virginia GOP

In a stunning escalation of Virginia s Republican infighting Matt Moran head of Gov Glenn Youngkin s Spirit of Virginia PAC has emerged as the central figure blamed for the widening rift between the governor and John Reid the GOP nominee for lieutenant governor After Reid publicly accused Spirit of Virginia of extortion Sunday without naming Moran his campaign lawyers fired a cease and desist letter directly at Moran Monday evening accusing him of making false and defamatory statements about Reid and threatening further legal action Moran has declined multiple requests for comment Related stories I will not back down Reid says he has no plans to exit Va LG race despite governor s request Sickened and outraged Va Lt Gov nominee lashes out at Gov Youngkin amid assertions over sexual posts How the Va lieutenant governor s race may play out after Youngkin calls on Reid to step aside Virginia voter guide What to know about casting a ballot in June primary ballot Meanwhile pressure is building inside the party for accountability Several GOP functionaries are urging the Republican Party of Virginia s Executive Committee to confidentially review the explicit images that Moran allegedly demonstrated Youngkin images that reportedly convinced the governor to personally ask Reid to drop out of the race The conclusion is a emergency that threatens not only to fracture Virginia Republicans months before Ballot Day but also to severely damage Youngkin s national ambitions Reid strikes back The dispute escalated after Reid a conservative radio host and the first openly gay statewide candidate from either party in Virginia posted a spirited video Sunday afternoon on X formerly Twitter I had certainly hoped that we could put the bigotry and ugliness of last week behind us and unify our Republican ticket this year Reid noted But shockingly once again representatives of my campaign have been notified by the leader of Governor Youngkin s political organization that the attacks on me will continue unless I drop out of the race for lieutenant governor Hours later Reid s legal squad delivered a cease-and-desist letter to Moran laying out accusations of defamation extortion and reckless disregard for the truth It has come to our attention that you provided information accusing our client of owning a Tumblr account containing unsavory images to multiple news organizations the letter reads While this account shared a common username with our client s Instagram he is not and never has been associated with the account Reid s attorneys explained Moran crossed the line into defamation because the statements were knowingly untrue and warned that continued publication of these false alleges would constitute actual malice In a particularly damning passage the letter alleged that Moran made direct threats in an April conversation with Reid You literally noted him getting out of the race is the only way it stops The lawyers further argued that Moran s accusations gave rise to defamation and defamation per se noting that falsely alleging Reid was linked to criminal behavior is so egregious that it is assumed to harm the plaintiff s reputation without further need to prove harm They demanded Moran promptly cease and desist from making or publishing any additional false asserts and instructed him to preserve all documents related to the development including communications with consulting firms and journalists GOP administrators demand action As the legal drama escalated particular Republican agents across the state voiced alarm at Moran s handling of the situation and called for transparency In a joint email sent to Republican Party of Virginia Chairman Mark Peake obtained by The Mercury Rick Buchanan chairman of the th Congressional District GOP Committee and John Massoud his counterpart in the th District urged the party leadership to allow members of the State Central Committee s Executive Committee to review any alleged evidence confidentially As leaders of the Republican Party of Virginia we are very concerned about our upcoming elections Buchanan and Massoud wrote Accusations have been made about our Lt Governor nominee that are very serious People are lining up on each side behind either the accuser or the accused yet the evidence behind the statements being made have not been forthcoming They stressed the need for unity warning In order for us to win this November this affair must be put behind us Giving us the actual facts will make that accomplishable In a phone interview Tuesday Buchanan went even further telling The Mercury that Youngkin must fire Moran to salvage party unity Either way we come out of this it has caused a lot of turmoil within the party he disclosed And I am very disappointed that the governor would listen to Moran without knowing the facts Amid the unfolding debate an event scheduled for Wednesday at Atlas in Henrico County featuring the full Republican statewide ticket with Youngkin billed as a special guest was abruptly canceled But Reid undeterred proven in a text message Tuesday that he still plans to go forward with the rally even without his running mates Former Republican Lt Gov Bill Bolling also weighed in Tuesday afternoon saying the episode had derailed what was supposed to be the GOP s first show of unity heading into the fall The Republican Party of Virginia was supposed to hold its first Unity Rally in Henrico County on the morrow evening Bolling wrote in a Facebook post but that was before Governor Glenn Youngkin accused John Reid the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor of posting sexually explicit photos on a Tumblr site bearing his name and called on him to withdraw from the campaign Bolling noted that Reid has consistently denied the claims and declared the central question whether Reid was ever associated with the explicit Tumblr account remains unresolved To date no one has been able to prove or disprove if this was in fact Reid s site Bolling wrote Although no one has yet explained why anyone would have created this site which has existed since to make Reid look bad Reid was not even a population figure in Moran silent as criticism mounts In a text message Tuesday Moran declined to comment But Virginia GOP figures like Casey Flores founder of the Richmond chapter of the Log Cabin Republicans the nation s largest Republican organization dedicated to representing LGBTQ conservatives made clear that Moran s position is becoming untenable I think that this is blowing back on Governor Youngkin and Matt Moran more than they ever expected Flores disclosed in a phone interview Flores accused Moran of trying to scuttle anything that doesn t make him money and explained his actions were now damaging the party s broader chances In the age of Trump people really don t care about all this even if the accusations against John Reid were true which they are not Flores revealed Firing Matt really is the only appropriate thing for Governor Youngkin to do Moran has been a fixture in Virginia politics for over a decade After managing one rural delegate s campaign and serving as a legislative aide for another he rose expeditiously first as spokesman for then-House Speaker William J Howell R-Stafford then as chief of staff to Speaker Kirk Cox R-Colonial Heights He later joined Youngkin s administration as director of framework and legislative affair but notably without taking a salary from the state Instead Moran stayed on leave from two consulting firms he had ownership interests in Creative Direct and Link Populace Affairs Critics revealed the arrangement created serious conflicts of interest There s certainly a cause for him to try to make money both within the administration and outside of Spirit of Virginia through his other companies Scott Pio chairman of the Loudoun County GOP Committee mentioned in a phone interview Pio whose committee hosted a rally for Reid in Sterling Monday evening suggested that Moran s dual loyalties allowed him to shape Virginia initiative while benefiting financially Since Matt doesn t have a statewide client he decides to throw this bomb Pio disclosed referencing the Reid disagreement which blew up just days after Fairfax County Supervisor Pat Herrity dropped out for soundness reasons last week He also argued that firing Moran was a necessary step to rebuild trust Youngkin being a businessman he should know when to hire and fire speedily He should not keep people around that are being inappropriate Youngkin s calculus and GOP damage control Even before the Reid episode Moran s unpaid status within the administration had drawn scrutiny In Youngkin s chief counsel Richard Cullen in an interview with The Washington Post defended Moran s arrangement saying He would have been the hottest guy in Richmond for lobbying But Matt did the opposite and to his financial detriment Moran declined an interview request for the same story but at the time issued a comment through Youngkin s press office defending his arrangement I am on leave from all companies and as a consequence do not have clients with business before the governor or state regime Moran announced I formalized this arrangement with counsel s office and I am fully committed to my organization to the governor and the people of Virginia It is a privilege to have the opportunity to serve the governor and work on behalf of the commonwealth His message did not explain why he chose to forgo a state salary Now however political observers say Moran s continued presence could be politically fatal not just in Virginia but nationally as Youngkin positions himself for a realizable White House run David Richards a political science professor at the University of Lynchburg explained the controversy has done tremendous damage to Youngkin and the GOP in Virginia It reveals a real limit to Youngkin s power in the state GOP and has exposed an ugly underbelly of the Republican party here Richards stated Someone in Youngkin s circle will have to take the fall It does not look like Reid will bow out Youngkin addressed the dispute publicly for the first time Tuesday during a press event at the Drug Enforcement Administration headquarters in Arlington Speaking to reporters Youngkin commented he reached out to Reid last Friday morning because the accusations involving explicit social media content had become a distraction Let me just promptly comment that one of the one of the reasons why I called John last Friday morning was because these kinds of situations where there is just a historical recognition that social media and explicit explicit social media content like this is a distraction Youngkin explained It s a distraction for campaigns and it s distraction from people paying attention to the majority of key issues and here we are in current times talking about fentanyl and saving lives and the distraction is present and that s why I called him on Friday morning and that s why he and I had a very serious personal conversation Lt Gov Winsome Earle-Sears the GOP s gubernatorial nominee broke her silence on the dispute surrounding her running mate Tuesday evening releasing a message that sought to both acknowledge the tension and pivot back to her own campaign Quoting former President Abraham Lincoln and the biblical verse he referenced Earle-Sears opened with a call for unity President Lincoln announced A house divided against itself cannot stand Those biblical words from Matthew embody the positive mission of our campaign to unite and inspire Virginians of all backgrounds she disclosed Earle-Sears acknowledged that the ongoing focus on Reid had derailed that effort This week focus on the lieutenant governor nominee distracted from that mission and cannot continue she announced While making clear that she would not be calling on him to step aside Earle-Sears emphasized that the decision belongs solely to Reid John Reid is the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor It is his race and his decision alone to move forward We all have our own race to run Reid meanwhile remains defiant and shows no sign of abandoning the ticket Bolling mentioned the lack of leadership at the top of the ticket is compounding the party s problems He noted that the dispute has prompted Reid to accuse Youngkin of trying to persecute him because he is a gay man a candidate Bolling stated the governor never longed on the Republican ticket Bolling warned that the stakes for Republicans this fall are too high to let the dispute linger One thing is for certain he noted This dispute cannot continue if Republicans who were facing an uphill ballot year to begin with are to have any chance of winning in November This debacle must be resolved one way or the other Source