Election officials determined on Tuesday that embattled Loudoun County Commonwealth’s Attorney Buta Biberaj (D) narrowly lost her re-election.
Biberaj fell short in her bid for a third term to challenger Bob Anderson, a Republican who served in the position from 1996 through 2003, by exactly 300 votes. Anderson received 68,068 votes – or 49.92 percent of the total – compared to Biberaj, who received 67,768 votes – or 49.7 percent of the total. A total of 518 voters wrote in a candidate for their ballots.
Anderson revealed on social media that Biberaj (above, right) conceded the race on Monday morning, and will not request a recount. Virginia law allows for candidates to request a recount when they are defeated by less than one percentage point.
Backed by a political action committee associated with Hungarian-American financier George Soros in 2019, the Biberaj was the subject of controversy when she ordered the June 2021 arrest and prosecution of Scott Smith, a parent whose daughter was sexually assaulted by a male student wearing a skirt in the bathroom of her Loudoun County public school.
Biberaj was recused from the case by Loudoun County Circuit Court Judge James Plowman in September 2022, who wrote in his order that “concerns about the public confidence in the integrity of the prosecution” and Smith’s “concerns regarding the impartiality” of Biberaj “are sufficiently grounded” to compel her recusal.
More recently, in February, multiple media outlets reported that Biberaj allegedly used taxpayer funds to investigate her political rivals. Biberaj was accused of using her official government email to file Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for messages exchanged between her political opponents and Loudoun County supervisors, according to Fox News. Democratic Loudoun County Supervisor Kristen Umstattd called on Biberaj to return the money government officials used to comply with the FOIA requests.
Explaining his decision to challenge Biberaj and desire to return to the job he held 20 years ago, Anderson (pictured above, left) previously told the Loudoun Times-Mirror he was motivated by Biberaj’s job performance.
“The office, quite frankly, from my vantage point of two terms, is in chaos,” he told the outlet in October. Anderson added that prosecutors “are not prepared and the people that they’re hiring are not well trained.”
Anderson lamented that Loudoun County prosecutors “simply can’t go into court unprepared,” warning that “the repercussions from that can be catastrophic.” He told the outlet that “people have been killed because of lack of preparation.” Anderson promised to run the office apolitically and said he intends to empower prosecutors during his tenure.
Prior to losing her re-election campaign, Biberaj was the subject of a recall effort led by Stand Up Virginia (SUV), who alleged that her progressive policies hurt victims of crimes in Loudoun County.
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Tom Pappert is the lead reporter for The Tennessee Star, and also reports for The Georgia Star News, The Virginia Star, and The Arizona Sun Times. Follow Tom on X/Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Buta Biberaj” by Buta Biberaj. Photo “Bob Anderson” by Bob Anderson.
