Virginia’s Democratic nominee for attorney general faced bipartisan backlash Friday night after text messages from 2022 surfaced in which he suggested the top Republican in the state House of Delegates “gets two bullets to the head.”
The messages by Jay Jones, who did not hold elected office at the time, were directed at then-speaker of the House Todd Gilbert.
“Three people, two bullets,” the text from Jones, first reported by National Review and later released by the Republican Attorney Generals Association, reads. “Gilbert, hitler, and pol pot.”
“Spoiler,” Jones’ text reads. “Put Gilbert in the crew with the two worst people you know and he receives both bullets every time.”
Jones did not deny the accuracy of the texts Friday night and said he takes “full responsibility” for his actions.
“I want to issue my deepest apology to Speaker Gilbert and his family. Reading back those words made me sick to my stomach. I am embarrassed, ashamed, and sorry,” he wrote in a statement obtained by NBC News.
“I have reached out to Speaker Gilbert to apologize directly to him, his wife Jennifer, and their children. I cannot take back what I said; I can only take full accountability and offer my sincere apology,” Jones wrote.
Gilbert, who was House speaker from 2022 to 2024, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday night.
Jones was reportedly texting former Republican House Delegate Carrie Coyner about Gilbert. Coyner at the time responded, “Jay” and “Please stop.”
Coyner confirmed to NBC News the authenticity of the texts.
“On August 8, 2022 I had a text conversation with Jay Jones, what he said was not just disturbing but disqualifying for anyone who wants to seek public office,” Coyner said in a statement.
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger shared her displeasure with Jones’ texts in a statement to NBC News.
“After learning of these comments earlier today, I spoke frankly with Jay about my disgust with what he had said and texted,” Spanberger wrote.
“I made clear to Jay that he must fully take responsibility for his words. What I have also made clear is that as a candidate — and as the next Governor of our Commonwealth, I will always condemn violent language in our politics,” she said.
Jones’ Republican opponent Jason Miyares did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday, but Republican gubernatorial candidate Winsome Earle-Sears called the texts “wholly disqualifying.”
“Jay Jones’ horrific comments are a symptom of the entire Democratic Party and his running mate, Abigail Spanberger, needs to call on him to drop out,” she wrote in a statement on X. “Jay Jones can never be Attorney General of Virginia.”
Early voting is well underway in Virginia, with more than 280,000 residents having already cast their ballot as of Oct. 1, according to the Virginia Public Access project.
The resurfaced text messages come amid more incidents of political violence in the U.S., including the murder of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and an attack on an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Dallas. Earlier this year, Minnesota state Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband were killed in what authorities have called a “politically motivated assassination.”
The Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan research group, released a study last week finding that the number of right-wing terror attacks in the U.S. plunged dramatically in the first half of 2025, while the amount of political violence from the left has ticked up. The same report found that an average of 20 right-wing terror incidents took place each year from 2011 through 2024, compared to an average of nearly three left-wing incidents annually during the same time period.
The study reviewed terror attacks and plots, defined by the authors as “the deliberate use or threat of premeditated violence by nonstate actors with the intent to achieve political goals by creating a broad psychological impact.”
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