Republican Wins Upset In Deep-Blue Seat After Muslim Democrat Busted For Racist Tweets
A Republican won a county-level seat in Northern Virginia on Tuesday in a major upset after revelations that her Democratic opponent made racist social media posts more than 10 years ago.
Republican Jeannie LaCroix, 64, won a special election for a seat on the Prince William County Board of Supervisors, defeating Democratic candidate Muhammed Sufiyan Casim, 36, a Muslim Pakistani immigrant who in the 2010s posted a series of online messages containing racist, misogynistic and anti-Semitic content, Potomac Local News reported. Casim, who was in his 20s when he posted the content, apologized for the posts in an interview with the Prince William Times – saying he had used the N-word “stupidly” and suggested he had copied the behavior of “brown ethnic” “kids” at the time.
“I was not realizing the cultural weight and context, so I used that word stupidlybbut not in a derogatory or harmful waydical way” the Democrat told the outlet, adding that he used the racial slur to refer to his black friend. “At this time, many children used this word both with children of African American descent and with people of any brown ethnicity.
In a March 2 article discussing the positions and confirming his intention not to drop out of the race, Casim said the rhetoric of the former Republican Board of Supervisors chairman, who left office seven years ago, “emboldened neo-Nazis,” before mentioning that he is Muslim.
Hate has no place in Prince William County. Our campaign was attacked by the political party that elected former board chairman Corey Stewart, whose rhetoric emboldened neo-Nazis.
My statement on past comments from my youth on social media: pic.twitter.com/ADNgMwkOUz
– Sef Casim (@SefCasim) March 2, 2026
“As a Muslim American who experienced life in America after 9/11, discussions about cultural sensitivity are very important to me,” the Pakistani immigrant wrote in his post.
LaCroix won 43.7% of the vote while Casim received 37.0% in Tuesday’s special election, according to the Prince William County Elections Office, Potomac Local News reported. The Republican capitalized on a divided Democratic camp since registered candidates obtained 19.2% of the vote. Democrat Pamela Montgomery — who lost her party’s primary to Casim — declared her candidacy as a write-in candidate just a week before Election Day, citing fallout from the candidate’s decade-old posts, according to the outlet. (RELATED: Marjorie Taylor Greene Is About to Be Replaced by a Trump-Backed Republican)
Despite his late entry, Montgomery led the pack of candidates in fundraising, according to Potomac Local News.
“For Democrats, fighting racism is not optional. It is fundamental,” Montgomery, who is black, wrote in a letter published by the Prince William Times on election day.
“When racist remarks surface, especially from someone seeking public office, the response must be clear: recognize it, condemn it, and demand accountability,” the unsuccessful Democratic primary candidate continued in her letter, pleading in favor of her write-in candidacy.
The Democratic candidate for Prince William County supervisor in Virginia has made a series of racist and misogynistic posts on social media.
He faced bipartisan calls to withdraw from the race https://t.co/QBLyy11lid pic.twitter.com/ZyuSKUXGhB
– Politics and poll tracking 📡 (@PollTracker2024) March 10, 2026
Tuesday’s race was to replace Democrat Margaret Franklin, who resigned from the Board of Supervisors after being elected to the Virginia House of Delegates in January. Franklin notably defeated Casim to win the Democratic nomination for the House of Representatives seat by a margin of more than two to one.
Prince William County, a wealthy and diverse county in the Washington metro area, is a Democratic stronghold that 2024 Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris won by 18 percentage points. Virginia’s Democratic Gov. Abigail Spanberger won the county’s vote by 34 points in November 2025. Precincts in the northeast part of the county, where Woodbridge is located, are among the bluest in the entire county, according to 2024 election data from VoteHub.
LaCroix’s surprise victory marks one of the few special elections in President Donald Trump’s second term in which a seat flipped from Democratic to Republican control. Conversely, over the past year, Democratic candidates have flipped several state legislative seats that Trump won by double digits in the 2024 elections.
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