In what should be an unsurprising development to every conservative in America, the “everyday normal Democrat voter” we are all told exists just came out in numbers to vote for assassination fetishist Jay Jones to be the next attorney general of Virginia.

We often hear some version of: I know their political leadership wants to groom and mutilate as many children as possible, kill as many unborn babies as possible, condone political violence against their opponents, and keep Americans addicted to drugs, homeless, destitute, and hopeless, but that doesn’t reflect every Democrat voter!

The fact that Jones beat incumbent Attorney General Jason Miyares, R-Va., by a relatively significant margin (52.73 percent to 46.87 percent) should be understood as the strongest rebuke of that “level-headed Democrat voter” notion.

Well over 1.7 million voters just told every conservative that they would rather have as attorney general a man who described in detail his desire to slaughter a Republican — former Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert — and have his children die in their mother’s arms than Miyares, whose tenure has been defined essentially by enforcing the law in an even-handed way and protecting girls in school from having men expose themselves to them.

What is clear is that Jones has some level of sinister discipline. The man he so badly wanted to assassinate was his colleague in the Virginia House of Delegates, whom he would have likely seen daily while in session. The children he wanted dead were known to the members of the House, including him, as Gilbert frequently brought them to the General Assembly. Jones certainly met them. He also apparently knew Gilbert’s wife, whom he wanted to hold the Gilbert children as they died.

What is unclear is what it might take to trigger Jones’ violent tendencies while in office, or how he intends to use his power to punish his political opponents, from elected officials to those who simply did not vote for him.

For Jones, it seems the answer is always death. He also reportedly advocated murdering police officers in order to prove a political point.

Democrats in Virginia sent the clearest message possible: Jones is their champion.

Democrats, and not just the political leadership, but “everyday Democrats” — your neighbors, your friends, your coworkers — are embracing their political movement’s penchant for violence.

They are the assassination left, and they are everywhere you look.

Naïve conservatives — an unfortunately large group — with Democrat friends want to believe that while we might disagree about policy, we all just want the best for our families and our country. It’s a common sentiment among conservatives, a group that has typically had a hard time being disagreeable.

However, Tuesday night’s election results should disabuse every affable conservative of that notion. Your Democrat friends might be friendly to you, but they just voted for a guy who wants you and your family dead.

It is no surprise. Democrats’ political leadership has been fabricating existential crises, convincing them that every Republican is some secret Nazi, thereby pre-justifying assassinations and other political violence against their conservative nemeses.

Their rationalizing became clear after the Jones assassination fantasy scandal broke. As The Federalist reported, Democrats were unwavering in their support of Jones after he said he wanted conservatives to be murdered and to have to watch their children die in their arms.

Democrats told The Federalist some version of Yeah, what he said was bad, but have you considered the alternative? Others were more explicit, saying Democrats needed to play “hardball,” apparently to keep up with whatever warped notion of “fascism” is happening under Republican leadership.

It would not be shocking to find out that not a single Democrat voter changed his vote after Jones’ family annihilation fantasies, and that is because, at some level, each and every Democrat who voted for him agrees with him. Perhaps some left that part of their ballot blank, but that is tacit agreement at best.

As The Federalist Editor-In-Chief Mollie Hemingway noted, “As bad as Jay Jones is, knowing that my neighbors genuinely support him as AG while wishing death on Republicans and their children is far worse.”

Breccan F. Thies is the White House correspondent for The Federalist. He previously covered education and culture issues for the Washington Examiner and Breitbart News. He holds a degree from the University of Virginia and is a 2022 Claremont Institute Publius Fellow. You can follow him on X: @BreccanFThies.