Spanberger Won’t Condemn Sympathetic Emails To Sex Offender

If you want to see Democrat Virginia gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger dance, ask her opinion about allowing men in women’s bathrooms, locker rooms, and sports teams. She has been tap-dancing around a straight answer for weeks. In a recent debate, when pressed, she said the decision is up to individuals and school districts.

A political gift in the news should have made it much easier for Spanberger to find clarity.  

An Arlington School Board allowed a sex offender to shower and dress in the girls’ pool locker room last year, WJLA TV’s Nick Minock reported on Thursday. As with many public schools, the pool and facilities are open to the public outside school hours. He also revealed that a current Arlington School Board member, when running for her school board position, had an empathetic email exchange with a male sex offender who used girls’ spaces at Arlington schools.

The Federalist asked Spanberger in an email if she supports trans-identifying, male sex offenders showering with young girls? And does she condemn the sympathetic emails between the sex offender and a school board member candidate?

Republican candidate Winsome Earle-Sears knows her position and is not ashamed to say it out loud: “Girls are girls, and boys are boys.” She will support policies that promote the separation of the sexes in sports and private areas.     

‘Community’ Shower

Richard Kenneth Cox, 58, a tier 3 registered sex offender since 1998 — a dude suffering from male pattern baldness — claimed to be a woman, and the school district policy was to let him into the girls’ areas. Then he complained that his experience was not inclusive enough.

Minock obtained emails between Cox and then-school board candidate Kathleen Clark, who was running for election at the time.

“Transgender people including minors are disproportionately homeless and use places like the County swimming pools to shower,” Cox reportedly wrote. “But let me be clear that this is not the only an opportunity to be clean but to be and feel part of the community. However, solely because of complaints of a transgender person in the locker room, Washington Liberty Swimming Pool made a rule that people using the shower but not the pool must use the single, isolated locker room away from everyone else, like they are some kind of freak or something. … [B]ut I did not want to feel isolated, I wanted to feel like part of the community.”  

As a rule of thumb, the shower is generally the wrong place for anyone to look for community. Just lather, rinse, and get out.   

According to the emails, Clark offered Cox a sympathetic ear and told him the pool staff needed more training.

Still Dancing

Spanberger spokeswoman Libby Wiet refused to condemn the then-candidate’s exchange of sympathetic emails with sex offender Richard Kenneth Cox. In fact, Spanberger’s office sidestepped the issue entirely when responding to The Federalist’s inquiry.

For a lot of people, there is a straightforward answer to the question, ”Do you support trans-identifying, male sex offenders showing with young girls?” The answer is a hard “No.”  

But Spanberger had her spokeswoman answer The Federalist with her trademark fogginess.  

“Convicted sex offender Richard Cox is a predator who should be in jail — and that’s exactly where he is,” Wiet said in an email. “Abigail is a parent of three daughters in Virginia public schools and a former federal law enforcement officer who went after child predators — nothing is more important to her than the safety of Virginia’s kids. As Governor, Abigail will work with state and local law enforcement officers to keep Virginia kids safe and make sure sex offenders are prevented from preying on children and are prosecuted for their crimes.”

Yeah, no. Spangerger still didn’t answer the question, so The Federalist asked again, and this time gave her an even easier way to answer: multiple choice.  

“Will she keep men out of women’s spaces? Yes or no?”

Spangerger’s office provided no answer. Spanberger is apparently not sure where she stands yet, even if a simple policy change would keep sex offenders — those charged and the yet-undiscovered creeps — away from members of the opposite sex.

Beth Brelje is an elections correspondent for The Federalist. She is an award-winning investigative journalist with decades of media experience.