State Sen. Ryan McDougle, 51, of Hanover, is the Republican candidate for the newly-drawn Virginia Senate District 26, which covers Gloucester and Mathews.
He has been the senator for Virginia’s current 4th Senate District since 2006. That district will be defunct as of January.
McDougle said that, if elected, his areas of focus will include making sure that drug dealers who sell controlled substances such as fentanyl to someone who dies from using the drug are held accountable by making such a crime “felony homicide” in order to take drug dealers off the street. He said he introduced a bill to do that this year, but it wasn’t adopted, and he intends to continue his efforts.
A second issue McDougle will address, he said, is repealing the requirement that the State Air Pollution Control Board implement a low-emission and zero-emission vehicle program for motor vehicles and prohibiting the board from adopting or enforcing any emission standards for new vehicles or engines. He said the emission control program used by Virginia was adopted by California, which has been granted a waiver from the standards.
Another area of interest for McDougle is making sure that parents are involved in their children’s education and that children can be “physically in school.”
“We need to not go back to that period again when kids can’t be in the classroom,” he said, adding that he proposed a bill last year that, if it had passed, would have prevented schools from keeping out children who haven’t had been vaccinated against Covid.
Finally, McDougle said he is in favor of Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s proposal to return a portion of the state’s $5 billion in excess revenues back to Virginians after priorities such as education are taken care of.
Other issues McDougle supports, according to his website, are holding the line on taxes, protecting Second Amendment rights, supporting the military and law enforcement, and offering greater affordability and choices in health care. He is also pro-life.
A lifelong resident of Hanover, McDougle spent his childhood working in his mother’s small plant business, getting up before school to dig plants. He said one of the businesses his mother worked for was a nursery in Mathews.
McDougle attended James Madison University, then attained his Juris Doctor degree at the Marshall-Wythe School of Law of the College of William and Mary. He began his career working as a prosecutor for the Hanover County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office, specializing in domestic violence and family abuse offenders. In that capacity, he established the Hanover County Child Advocate Response Team. He then established his own law practice, McDougle Law Firm, PC, in Hanover.
After serving two terms in the Virginia House of Delegates beginning in 2002, McDougle won a special election for his current seat in the Senate, where he is chairman of the Virginia Senate Republican Caucus and a member of the Judiciary, Privilege and Elections, Rehabilitation and Social Services, and Rules committees.
McDougle and his wife, Dr. Robyn McDougle, have one daughter, Reagan. He is opposed in the Nov. 7 general election by Democratic challenger Pamela Garner.