Tara Durant, a former schoolteacher and a state legislator in Virginia, got her start in local politics after a tense encounter with Black Lives Matter demonstrators in 2020 while she was driving in downtown Fredericksburg with her daughter. She called the police from her car and said protesters were blocking passage, only to be told that the city government sanctioned the protest and could not intervene. She was elected to Virginia’s house of delegates in 2021, and in November she won an open seat in the state senate.
Durant spoke with National Review about what motivated her to run for office and how she won her latest election in a swing district even as Old Dominion Democrats retook the house and narrowly held their majority in the senate. The interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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