Chesapeake is a purple city that has often voted for Democrats, including in four of the past five presidential elections. But no Democrat or independent had filed to run for sheriff in advance of a mid-June deadline, to the immense frustration of local immigrant rights advocates who’d hoped to have an alternative to rally around. “It blows my mind that there’s no opposition,” Maida Dooley, an organizer in the region, told Bolts in early June, calling local party leadership complacent. “Maybe they don’t care,” she said.

I always wonder why I see seats with no candidate in them. I believe in many states there aren’t really any prerequisites to being Sherrif, so you could put anyone up for the job. It sounds like this area is open to Dem candidates, so to drop the ball on something important like sheriff right now comes across as very fatalistic on an important issue.

“He was the candidate that was in line with our values,” local party chair David Washington told Bolts.

Which ones?

When it came time for the committee to vote on whether to endorse Rosado, members were asked to hold up a voting card—green for support, red for opposed.

“I saw a sea of green, and myself as the only red,” said D.J. McGuire, a committee member and an advocate for immigrants’ rights. Just two days prior, McGuire had spoken to Chesapeake’s city council to urge it to cut off any local cooperation with ICE.

McGuire, who used to be a Republican but quit the party after Trump emerged as its leader last decade, says he was one of only a few people to press Rosado at the July 10 meeting.

What is up with this place? The Dems are endorsing the Republicans while the recent Republican is trying to stop them. What a bizarro story…