WASHINGTON — Attorney General Mark Herring and challenger John Adams, former federal prosecutor and clerk with the U.S. Supreme Court, wasted no time going after one another in the final debate before the Nov. 7 election.
“To me, this job isn’t about politics. It’s about serving your fellow Virginia,” said Herring, a Democrat from Loudoun County, on Friday. “But for John, he has a different view. He wants to be a lawyer for the Republican caucus down in Richmond.”
Adams, a Republican who has never run for office, defended his aspirations.
“I am running to get the politics out of the attorney general’s office,” said Adams, a VMI graduate who served in the Navy. He accused Herring of pushing his own personal political views instead of being the lawyer for Virginia and for its residents.
“For the attorney general’s office to be so politicized, that it’s not we the people who choose our laws through our elected representatives but it’s an attorney general’s office that forces its view on the citizens — that is just wrong,” Adams said.
Herring said that one of his big successes as attorney general is the work that he and his office have done on battling the opioid crisis. He said his office has put together a comprehensive response.
“We stepped up prosecutions against dealers and traffickers who bring these dangerous drugs into Virginia,” said Herring. He added that his office also helped pass the “Good Samaritan Law” that protects those who report overdoses and that he created the documentary “The Hardest Hit.”
But Adams shot back.
“When your attorney general is running around doing political things all the time, bad things happen. The heroin/opioid crisis that he’s worked so hard to fix is spiraling out of control. It is getting much, much worse. Not better. Violent crime in the state is going through the roof in Virginia.”
Herring said he’s fighting to get Virginians health care and blasted Adams for not wanting to cover people with pre-existing conditions and wanting to roll back the Affordable Care Act.
“[Herring] loves to say that ‘John is against covering pre-existing conditions.’ I’ve never said any such thing and that’s not what I believe at all,” Adams answered. “All Virginians need access to affordable health care, quality health care, including those with pre-existing conditions. Herring believes in a centralized government process, a government-run health care program. I believe we can achieve those results through a private insurance operating in a free market. We just have different political views on it.”
The debate was held by the Loudoun County Chamber of Commerce, at the National Conference Center in Leesburg.
